Jim McDermott

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Becerra).

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, refugees come to America fleeing persecution, injustice, torture and even death. During a hearing before the Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support, we heard from one of those refugees. His name was K'Keng, and he fought alongside American forces during the Vietnam war. In fact, he was recruited and trained by our Special Forces. After the U.S. pulled out of Vietnam, he was imprisoned for 6 years as a political prisoner, after which he eventually made it to the United States as a refugee. He tried working, but the wounds he suffered during the war made that difficult. Based on his disability and the fact that he had almost no other source of income, he began receiving Supplemental Security Income, or SSI, benefits. But those benefits were terminated when he reached a 7-year time limit on SSI on refugees. He is now 75, partially blind, and lives on only a few hundred dollars worth of food stamps every month, as well as assistance from his young son. Nearly 7,000 elderly and disabled refugees have lost their SSI benefits. The Social Security Administration projects another 16,000 will do so over the next few years unless the Congress acts. As the beacon of freedom around the world, America can do better than this. While it is true that a refugee may continue to receive SSI if he or she becomes a citizen, a series of obstacles make that transition to citizenship difficult within the 7-year limit of SSI benefits. First, a refugee must live in the United States for at least 5 years before they are eligible to submit an application for citizenship. A refugee must then confront a lengthy application process which can take up to 3 to 4 years. Backlogs in processing citizenship applications have been caused by a variety of issues, including protracted background checks put in place after September 11 terrorist attacks. There are other barriers to citizenship, such as the continuing impact of the recent annual cap on the number of asylees who may become legal permanent residents, a status which asylees must maintain for 4 years before they may submit an application for citizenship. Also, some disabled and elderly refugees encounter difficulties navigating the application process, which includes both an English language and a U.S. civics test. I'm pleased to say there is bipartisan support for addressing this issue. The last several budget proposals from the Bush administration have called for an extension in SSI benefits for refugees, and there is a bipartisan bill pending in the U.S. Senate. I would like especially to thank Mr. Weller, the ranking member on the Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support, for working with me to forge the bipartisan bill we are now considering. This bill, H.R. 2608, would generally extend SSI benefits for an additional 2 years for disabled and elderly refugees, asylees and other qualified humanitarian immigrants, including those whose benefits have expired in the recent past. Benefits could be extended for an additional period for those awaiting a decision on pending application for citizenship. These policies would be in effect till 2010. The legislation completely offsets the cost of the SSI extension for refugees within a provision that will reduce Federal tax refunds to recover unemployment insurance debts due to fraud. The Federal tax refund offset authority already exists to collect unpaid child support, unpaid State taxes and debts owed to the Federal agencies. The bill simply says that if a State concludes that a worker has fraudulently received unemployment benefits or a business owner has failed to pay UI taxes based on fraud, the State can seek to receive a portion of any Federal tax refund that the individual may be owed. Before pursuing a tax offset, the State would be required to notify the individual and provide them with at least 60 days to contest the amount being recovered. By catching and reducing fraud in the unemployment insurance system, this provision not only offsets the cost of the SSI extension for refugees, but it also will reduce unemployment taxes on employers. The Joint Committee on Taxation estimates the legislation will cut payroll taxes by $326 million over the next 10 years. Mr. Speaker, refugees come to our country fleeing persecution. They reside in our country legally, and those eligible for SSI are disabled, elderly or both. This legislation extends a modest benefit to help them provide for their most basic essentials. The bill will not add one dime to the Federal deficit, and it will even provide a tax cut. Such a combination should ensure broad support for this vital effort to help those most in need. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, once again, I want to thank Mr. Weller. Mr. Speaker, I will include in the Record documents relating to this legislation, including a letter from the Commissioner of Social Security articulating the need for this bill and an estimate from the Congressional Budget Office, which highlights the fact that this bill is completely paid for. In fact, it actually reduces the deficit by nearly $50 million. Social Security Administration, Washington, DC, July 10, 2007. Hon. Charles B. Rangel, Chairman, Committee on Ways and Means, House of Representatives, Washington, DC. Dear Mr. Chairman: I am writing to provide the Social Security Administration's (SSA) views on H.R. 2608, the SSI Extension for Elderly and Disabled Refugees Act. SSA fully supports an extension of the time period in which refugees, asylees, and certain other humanitarian categories of noncitizens may remain eligible for Supplemental Security Income (SSI) while seeking U.S. citizenship. The current time limit is 7 years, and some aged, blind, and disabled individuals have been unable to obtain U.S. citizenship within this time period. The Administration recognizes the daunting challenges refugees have faced in fleeing tyranny, the adjustments they must make in their resettlement, and their need for additional help in their quest for U.S. citizenship. Section 2 of H.R. 2608 would amend the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 to permit a 9-year period for SSI eligibility, provide retroactive eligibility for refugees and asylees who previously became ineligible after 7 years, and exempt the general SSI prohibition for refugees and asylees with pending naturalization applications. These changes would be in effect from 2008-2010. This provision is similar to the Administration's proposal for an extension to 8 years that was in the President's budget in FY 2005, FY 2006, FY 2007 and FY 2008. One difference between H.R. 2608 and the Administration's proposal is that the retroactive effect of H.R. 2608 could require SSA to reinstate SSI payments for individuals who have been off of the rolls for many years. While this represents a new workload, we would like to work with Congress to address the administrative burden inherent with such an effort, with the overall goal of assisting aged, blind, and disabled individuals in becoming U.S. citizens. A similar letter has been sent to Representative McCrery. Sincerely, Michael J. Astrue, Commissioner.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 2608) to amend section 402 of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 to provide, in fiscal years 2008 through 2010, extensions of supplemental security income for refugees, asylees, and certain other humanitarian immigrants, and to amend the Internal Revenue Code to collect unemployment compensation debts resulting from fraud.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Madam Speaker, the City of Seattle and our Nation recently lost one of the great leaders in the field of medicine, Dr. John R. Hogness, a friend, colleague, and constituent. Dr. Hogness contributed to the common good throughout his 85 years of life. John wasn't merely a community asset, although he was that; John was a national treasure and we shall miss him. Dr. Hogness served with distinction as the first president of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences. Under John's leadership, the Institute grew to become a trusted, independent voice, at times courageous, at times bold, but always fair and forward thinking. The high standards Dr. Hogness applied to himself always became trademarks of the organizations he led. And he led some of America's best institutions, including the University of Washington. Dr. John Hogness served as a president of the University of Washington, dean of the medical school, and vice president for medical affairs. The UW is an internationally acclaimed institution today, in part, because of the significant contributions made by Dr. John Hogness. He never forgot his roots as a medical doctor and never forgot that medicine is about healing the pain and suffering of people. Throughout his distinguished career, John believed that academia had a role and responsibility to champion the common good, and so Dr. Hogness long advocated for a national health plan because he believed that everyone had a right to receive medical treatment. John was just as comfortable filling in for a rural medical doctor in Omak who wanted to take a vacation as he was creating a new department of bioengineering at the University of Washington. Of course, he excelled at both, drawing on his intellect, sense of humor, modesty and commitment to public service. While this may not be your stereotypical academic, it defines Dr. John Hogness. From time to time, John might have been out of step with the status quo, but he was never out of touch with the people medicine was intended to help, or the medical advances that could save more lives and ease more suffering. John once remarked that he was most proud of his role in creating an innovative regional medical education program serving Alaska, Washington, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. Medical students attend the University of Washington's School of Medicine, the only medical school in the five states, but the young doctors intern in all five states. It makes the rural practice of medicine real to young doctors and reality to rural communities throughout the region. The long list of achievements can be summed up simply by knowing that Dr. John Hogness did so much for so many. Rather than mourn his passing, I hope that we celebrate the life of Dr. John Hogness by remembering he was an intellectual giant who never forgot how to make house calls.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, the President intends to stay the course in Iraq. His latest quote is we might be able to bring soldiers home ``in awhile,'' and the White House is circulating a memo that they see progress. This is another whitewash from the White House. When they talk about progress in Iraq, remember they misled us before. CNN Larry King Live, May 30, 2005, the vice president said: I think they're in the last throes, if you will, of the insurgency. By then, 1,000 U.S. soldiers were dead. USA Today, November 24, 2005, the headline is: Officials more hopeful on Iraq drawdown. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told Fox News on Tuesday that the U.S. would probably not need to maintain its current troop levels in Iraq ``very much longer.'' By then, there were 2,000 Americans dead. USA Today, January 4, 2006, the headline is: Bush, Cheney stump seeking public support. Bush met with military leaders at the Pentagon and reiterated previously announced plans to cut U.S. troop strength in Iraq. ``The adjustment is underway,'' he said, suggesting further cuts would come if Iraqi security forces improved. By then, 2,200 Americans were dead. USA Today March 26, 2006, the headline is, Rice speaks of possible troop drawdown. ``I think it is entirely probable that we will see a significant drawdown of American forces over the next year. It's all dependent on events on the ground,'' the chief American diplomat said. By then, 2,300 Americans were dead. The Washington Post, June 15, 2006, the headline is: Bush Sees Progress in Iraq. In a Rose Garden news conference just over 6 hours after his surprise whirlwind visit to Baghdad, Bush said, ``I sense something different happening in Iraq,'' and predicted that ``progress will be steady'' towards achieving the U.S. mission there. By then, 2,500 Americans were dead. USA Today, October 1, 2006, the headline: Bush Sees Progress in Iraq War Effort. President Bush said Saturday he is encouraged by the increasing size and capacity of the Iraq security forces, touting progress on a key measure for when U.S. troops can come home. By then, 2,800 U.S. soldiers had died. Fox News, Sunday, January 11, 2007, Chris Wallace interviewed the vice president: Mr. Vice President, why should we believe you this time that you have it right? Mr. Cheney responded, Well, if you look at what has transpired in Iraq, Chris, we have in fact made enormous progress. By then, 3,000 Americans were dead. In the months since the Vice President saw enormous progress, another 600 U.S. soldiers had died in Iraq. Over 3,600 U.S. soldiers are dead, 26,000 seriously wounded, and 40,000 will suffer with post-traumatic stress disorder, and the White House keeps telling the American people that we are making progress. There is no credibility left whatsoever in the White House. None. The White House cannot whitewash the truth any longer. The American people are exasperated by a Commander in Chief who is blind to what is happening in Iraq. U.S. soldiers have not failed, but this President has. U.S. commanders have not failed, but this administration has. The American people know it and they want only one new order given: Get U.S. soldiers out of Iraq. That means by early spring next year. It would be a travesty of justice if it takes until the general election of 2008 for the American people to throw every Republican out in order to stop the war. We are 17 months away from a new President being sworn into office. That is another 2,000 U.S. casualties if we follow this President. Ten soldiers are dying every day. Ninety soldiers are gravely wounded every day. A hundred civilian Iraqis die. How many more must die before we stand up for our soldiers? Before we stand up for our national interests and get our soldiers out of Iraq? Bring them home. Mr. Speaker, we have got to get the President to bring them home. We also ought to think about how many Iraqis have died in this whole thing.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, as we walk around our hometowns and cities, who thinks about the young people we pass hanging around in front of a store or a park or street corner? Some people simply avert their eyes and walk a bit faster, focusing on something else. Others, they quickly step by and try to get by them. Can we tell which of them are begging, borrowing or stealing to eat? Do we stop and consider if these kids are selling drugs or their own bodies in order to buy food or pay for shelter? Too few of us are willing to ask whether these young people might be homeless, and the fact is too many of them are homeless on the streets of our hometowns. As many as 2.8 million kids are homeless right now, right in front of our eyes, if we choose to look and see. Some of these homeless kids are fleeing an unsafe home. Others are running from a child welfare system that fails them too frequently. And others are on the street for a myriad of other reasons. Whatever the reason, they are alone, afraid and vulnerable, unsure where to turn for help or to whom they can trust. Sometimes help arrives too late. On an average, 13 homeless youth die every day from assault, suicide or sickness. It happens in our hometowns across America, and we need to take a stand. We can be the lifeline that pulls these young people back from the brink. The Income Security and Family Support Subcommittee is in the process of conducting hearings on the ways America can ensure that vulnerable children look to us for help instead of to the streets where the pushers and pimps profit on our inadequacy in protecting these vulnerable youngsters. Federal resources like the Social Security Block Grant; title IV of the Social Security Act; and moneys provided under the Runaway, Homeless and Missing Children Protection Act do help vulnerable and homeless children. But our resources are falling short. It is like standing on the shore with a lifeline that only reaches 25 feet when the person drowning is 50 feet from shore. We are coming up short in spite of our best intentions. The Federal Government should be doing more to prevent youth homelessness and provide a pathway towards self-sufficiency when children fall through the cracks. We can do a better job of partnering with State and local governments, nonprofits and faith-based organizations to provide assistance to vulnerable families and youth. Imagine you are in the foster care system, and suddenly you are 18 and you are out of the system. You are on your own. You didn't have parents. You didn't have a family. That is why you were in foster care. And suddenly we throw these kids into adult life. In many cases, they wind up homeless. In addition to meaningful reforms in Federal programs, I think the House of Representatives can also empower private and public organizations, citizens who employ their talent and compassion to prevent youth homelessness and provide help to homeless youth when prevention fails. Mr. Speaker, the resolution before us, House Resolution 527, would say that, for 1 month out of the year, America is going to recognize that youth homelessness is an important challenge that we must face as a Nation. More importantly, it will say to every homeless young person that you are not alone anymore. The People's House sees you, and we intend to help. Organizations like Stand Up For Kids, which coordinates a nationwide effort to scour the streets searching for kids and providing resources for them, is one inspiration behind this measure. But it is the kids that should remind us of our duty to provide for and protect American youth and to pass this resolution. Let this be the last day that we walk along the streets of our hometowns and not see the young people who are homeless young Americans. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 527) recognizing the month of November as ``National Homeless Youth Awareness Month''.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I ask for unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and to include extraneous material on this resolution which we are now considering.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Madam Speaker, it is time for a new exit strategy, one that removes the Vice President of the United States from office, voluntarily, if he chooses, but by impeachment if he stonewalls. The time has come for the Vice President to go. Our Nation and our national security interests at home and abroad cannot afford to have this Vice President one heartbeat away from the Presidency. As it stands now, the Vice President's damage to U.S. interests, security, system of government and our position at home and abroad will take years to overcome. As my constituents in the State of Washington's Seventh Congressional District know, I have struggled mightily with this matter for a long time. In grave matters facing our Nation, I believe conscience and a deep respect for our system of government should guide our actions and words. I didn't hesitate to speak the truth to power before the invasion of Iraq, despite the bitter partisan acts that I knew would follow. I have no doubt that I will be targeted for a new round of shelling after these remarks. The intent of this administration and this Vice President has been to silence all dissent, and it always happens the same way; relentless attacks until people ask themselves, do I want to subject myself to that kind of hell if I speak out? Fear is what kept this administration in office in 2004, and fear is the only public discourse this administration understands and practices. Why debate, when you can dictate? Why follow the law, when you can act like you are above the law? For months, I believed that impeachment was a dire course of action. Over these same months, I have seen the haven't repeatedly drive our Nation into increasingly dire situations in Iraq, Iran and within our country as he tramples on the Constitution like it was a doormat. For months I have considered if America would best be served by bringing forth articles of impeachment against the Vice President. I kept asking myself, is the Vice President's conduct that dire, because impeachment is the closest thing there is to internment on political death row. The Founders intended impeachment to be used when those running the government forgot that they worked for the people, and the Founders intended impeachment to be used when toughs running the government acted as though they were above the law. When you look at the record, you have to conclude that the Vice President has placed himself above the law. He holds himself accountable only to special interests, who meet with him in secret with no record kept of who was there, what was discussed or what promises the Vice President made. For the last 4 years, the Vice President has refused to allow routine office inspections by a Federal agency regarding the safe handling of America's secrets. The Vice President defies the Information Security Oversight Agency, claiming he is not part of the executive branch of government. When a sitting Vice President claims that he is not part of the executive branch of government to which he was elected, it is time to remove him. The Vice President holds himself accountable to no one. He ordered the Secret Service to destroy visitors logs, and we have learned in the Washington Post recently, that the Vice President circumvented every check and balance inside the White House to force through his own agenda, to spy on Americans through illegal wire traps, creating the gulag at Guantanamo, and subverting civil liberties and free speech at every turn. Since the President permits the flagrant disregard of the Constitution, it is up to the Congress to act and defend the American people. With each new revelation, America has seen only glints of what has been done totally in secret. For all we don't know, this much we do know: The Vice President holds himself above the law, and it is time for the Congress to enforce the law. I believe the evidence is overwhelming and the articles of impeachment against the Vice President should be drawn up. The Vice President likes to say the military option is on the table. Tonight it is time to say the impeachment option is on the table. I am adding my name to H.R. 333, calling for the impeachment. For the good of the Nation, the Vice President should leave office immediately. Call it a medical condition, call it a political condition, call it what it is; the departure of a person who forgot that he works for the American people. The Vice President must either resign or face impeachment. Madam Speaker, I submit for the Record an article in Slate magazine dated 27 June 2004, entitled ``Impeach Cheney.'' [From Slate.com, June 27, 2007] Impeach Cheney--The Vice President Has Run Utterly Amok and Must Be Stopped (By Bruce Fein) Under Dick Cheney, the office of the vice president has been transformed from a tiny acorn into an unprecedented giant oak. In grasping and exercising presidential powers, Cheney has dulled political accountability and concocted theories for evading the law and Constitution that would have embarrassed King George III. The most recent invention we know of is the vice president's insistence that an executive order governing the handling of classified information in the executive branch does not reach his office because he also serves as president of the Senate. In other words, the vice president is a unique legislative-executive creature standing above and beyond the Constitution. The House Judiciary Committee should commence an impeachment inquiry. As Alexander Hamilton advised in the Federalist Papers, an impeachable offense is a political crime against the nation. Cheney's multiple crimes against the Constitution clearly qualify. Take the vice president's preposterous theory that his office is outside the executive branch because it also exercises a legislative function. The same can be said of the president, who also exercises a legislative function in signing or vetoing bills passed by Congress. Under Cheney's bizarre reasoning, President Bush is not part of his own administration: The executive branch becomes acephalous. Today Cheney Chief of Staff David Addington refused to renounce that reasoning, instead laughably trying to diminish the importance of the legal question at issue. The nation's first vice president, John Adams, bemoaned: ``My country has in its wisdom contrived for me the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived or his imagination conceived; and as I can do neither good nor evil, I must be borne away by others and meet common fate.'' Vice President John Nance Garner, serving under President Franklin D. Roosevelt, lamented: ``The vice presidency isn't worth a pitcher of warm * * *.'' In modern times, vice presidents have generally been confined to attending state funerals or to distributing blankets after earthquakes. Then President George W. Bush outsourced the lion's share of his presidency to Vice President Cheney, and Mr. Cheney has made the most of it. Since 9/11, he has proclaimed that all checks and balances and individual liberties are subservient to the president's commander in chief powers in confronting international terrorism. Let's review the record of his abuses and excesses: The vice president asserted presidential power to create military commissions, which combine the functions of judge, jury, and prosecutor in the trial of war crimes. The Supreme Court rebuked Cheney in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. Mr. Cheney claimed authority to detain American citizens as enemy combatants indefinitely at Guantanamo Bay on the president's say-so alone, a frightening power indistinguishable from King Louis XVI's execrated lettres de cachet that occasioned the storming of the Bastille. The Supreme Court repudiated Cheney in Hamdi v. Rumsfeld. The vice president initiated kidnappings, secret detentions, and torture in Eastern European prisons of suspected international terrorists. This lawlessness has been answered in Germany and Italy with criminal charges against CIA operatives or agents. The legal precedent set by Cheney would justify a decision by Russian President Vladimir Putin to kidnap American tourists in Paris and to dispatch them to dungeons in Belarus if they were suspected of Chechen sympathies. The vice president has maintained that the entire world is a battlefield. Accordingly, he contends that military power may be unleashed to kill or capture any American citizen on American soil if suspected of association or affiliation with al-Qaida. Thus, Mr. Cheney could have ordered the military to kill Jose Padilla with rockets, artillery, or otherwise when he landed at O'Hare Airport in Chicago, because of Padilla's then-suspected ties to international terrorism. Mr. Cheney has championed a presidential power to torture in contravention of federal statutes and treaties. He has advocated and authored signing statements that declare the president's intent to disregard provisions of bills he has signed into law that he proclaims are unconstitutional, for example, a requirement to obtain a judicial warrant before opening mail or a prohibition on employing military force to fight narco-terrorists in Colombia. The signing statements are tantamount to absolute line-item vetoes that the Supreme Court invalidated in the 1998 case Clinton v. New York. The vice president engineered the National Security Agency's warrantless domestic surveillance program targeting American citizens on American soil in contravention of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. He concocted the alarming theory that the president may flout any law that inhibits the collection of foreign intelligence, including prohibitions on breaking and entering homes, torture, or assassinations. As a reflection of his power in this arena, today the Senate Judiciary Committee subpoenaed Cheney's office, as well as the White House, for documents that relate to the warrantless eavesdropping. The vice president has orchestrated the invocation of executive privilege to conceal from Congress secret spying programs to gather foreign intelligence, and their legal justifications. He has summoned the privilege to refuse to disclose his consulting of business executives in conjunction with his Energy Task Force, and to frustrate the testimonies of Karl Rove and Harriet Miers regarding the firings of U.S. attorneys. Cheney scorns freedom of speech and of the press. He urges application of the Espionage Act to prosecute journalists who expose national security abuses, for example, secret prisons in Eastern Europe or the NSA's warrantless surveillance program. He retaliated against Ambassador Joseph Wilson and his wife, Valerie Plame, through Chief of Staff Scooter Libby, for questioning the administration's evidence of weapons of mass destruction as justification for invading Iraq. Mr. Cheney is defending himself from a pending suit brought by Wilson and Plame on the grounds that he is entitled to the absolute immunity of the president established in 1982 by Nixon v. Fitzgerald. (Although this defense contradicts Cheney's claim that he is not part of the executive branch.) The Constitution does not expressly forbid the president from abandoning his chief powers to the vice president. But President Bush's tacit delegation to Cheney and Cheney's eager acceptance tortures the Constitution's provision for an acting president. The presidency and vice presidency are discrete constitutional offices. The 12th Amendment provides for their separate elections. The sole constitutionally enumerated function of the vice president is to serve as president of the Senate without a vote except to break ties. In contrast, Article II enumerates the powers and responsibilities of the president, including the obligation to take care that the laws be faithfully executed. A special presidential oath is prescribed. Section 3 of the 25th Amendment provides a method for the president to yield his office to the vice president, when ``he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.'' There is no other constitutional provision for transferring presidential powers to the vice president. Yet without making a written transmittal to Congress, President Bush has ceded vast domains of his powers to Vice President Cheney by mutual understanding that circumvents the 25th Amendment. This constitutional provision assures that the public and Congress know who is exercising the powers of the presidency and who should be held responsible for successes or failures. The Bush-Cheney dispensation blurs political accountability by continually hiding the real decision-maker under presidential skirts. The Washington Post has thoroughly documented the vice president's dominance in a four-part series running this week. It is quite a read. In the end, President Bush regularly is unable to explain or defend the policies of his own administration, and that is because the heavy intellectual labor has been performed in the office of the vice president. Cheney is impeachable for his overweening power and his sneering contempt of the Constitution and the rule of law.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. We appreciate the legislation that you've put before us today. The Andean Trade Preference Promotion Act continues to enjoy broad bipartisan support, and I believe the program is needed because we have a responsibility to ensure that our market, the largest in the world, remains open to the products from developing nations. ATPA is a program that is helping to reduce poverty and strengthen our economic ties with our hemisphere, but it really is only one scheme of many. The generalized system of preferences is also a vital tool we use to fight global poverty and better engage with developing countries. As you know, the duty-free treatment GSP provides to imports coming from developing nations like India and Brazil is at risk of being eliminated by the Bush administration. In the case of India, the tariffs the Bush administration will propose on Indian jewelry will cause the loss of 300,000 jobs, and that would weaken our strategic alliance with an important ally. In this case, what's bad for India is also bad for the United States. Now, in the coming weeks and months, I hope that we can work together to ensure that any GSP benefits aren't revoked for arbitrary reasons that would have a negative outcome in developing countries. And I hope that you would be willing to listen to those kind of proposals.

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, is the gentleman from New York willing to engage in a brief colloquy?

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, my colleagues are saying we must have an end to the war, as have two Republican Senators. It is time for us to look at the actions of the Vice President of the United States. You remember when George Bush sent Dick Cheney out to find a Vice President and he found himself? Well, if you read the last 4 days of The Washington Post, you read a chilling picture of the actions of the Vice President as he manipulated the intelligence leading us into the war. He has been the driving force to keep us in that war and still is today. Then when questioned about what he does over there, he says, I am not a member of the executive. I don't know exactly. I have an office here, but I am not covered by the things the President says. This man has been evading an Executive Order from 2003 by the President of the United States that everyone tell how they are covering classified material. But the Vice President is above that. The Vice President is not above investigation by the House of Representatives for his actions in taking us into war and keeping us there.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, they say they care about the soldiers. The President and his administration talk a lot about the soldiers, but in Iraq, the situation keeps getting worse. There are another 18 months left in this administration, and unless the Republicans finally dig in and demand action instead of words, casualties will continue to rise at a horrendous rate. In the 18 months the President remains in office, 1,800 more soldiers will die and 18,000 more U.S. soldiers will be wounded if they keep up at the present rate. We are suffering as mightily as we did in Vietnam, and the results are just as catastrophic and just as preventable. We have a choice, but this President chooses to spend more U.S. lives in Iraq, and he does so with the full support of the Republican Party, which is the only way he can survive. The American people have spoken, the Democratic Party has spoken, we all said the same thing: Set a timetable and get U.S. soldiers out of Iraq's civil war. Even the majority of Iraq's elected Parliament has demanded a timetable for U.S. withdrawal, but the President ignores it all. So far, the Republican Party has sat on its conscience and given the President every blank check he asks for. Too many Republicans in this House and Senate know the truth, but they remain silent and acquiescence and give up their congressional responsibility. The American people have submerged the President's approval rating in an effort to get his attention, but he keeps ignoring the fact, the evidence and the lessons of history. And it is be possible because blind allegiance has become the litmus test of the members of his party. Republicans used to give the President blank checks, now they give him a rubber stamp veto to keep Americans fighting and dying in a war he lost several years ago. U.S. casualties will continue to rise at the President continues to escalate his stay-the-course policy in Iraq. The President's stubbornness has nothing to do with taking new ground in Iraq, but it has everything to do with gaining rights to what's underground in Iraq, the oil wealth of the Iraqi people. That's why the rhetoric is already being planted by the administration with friendly media that September won't really matter when it comes to a progress report. As Frank Rich reported in the Sunday New York Times, the fix is already on. And I will enter this journalism into the Record. [From the New York Times, June 24, 2007] They'll Break the Bad News on 9/11 (By Frank Rich) By this late date we should know the fix is in when the White House's top factotums fan out on the Sunday morning talk shows singing the same lyrics, often verbatim, from the same hymnal of spin. The pattern was set way back on Sept. 8, 2002, when in simultaneous appearances three cabinet members and the vice president warned darkly of Saddam's aluminum tubes. ``We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud,'' said Condi Rice, in a scripted line. The hard sell of the war in Iraq--the hyping of a (fictional) nuclear threat to America--had officially begun. America wasn't paying close enough attention then. We can't afford to repeat that blunder now. Last weekend the latest custodians of the fiasco, our new commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, and our new ambassador to Baghdad, Ryan Crocker, took to the Sunday shows with two messages we'd be wise to heed. The first was a confirmation of recent White House hints that the long-promised September pivot point for judging the success of the ``surge'' was inoperative. That deadline had been asserted as recently as April 24 by President Bush, who told Charlie Rose that September was when we'd have ``a pretty good feel'' whether his policy ``made sense.'' On Sunday General Petraeus and Mr. Crocker each downgraded September to merely a ``snapshot'' of progress in Iraq. ``Snapshot,'' of course, means ``Never mind!'' The second message was more encoded and more ominous. Again using similar language, the two men said that in September they would explain what Mr. Crocker called ``the consequences'' and General Petraeus ``the implications'' of any alternative ``courses of action'' to their own course in Iraq. What this means in English is that when the September ``snapshot'' of the surge shows little change in the overall picture, the White House will say that ``the consequences'' of winding down the war would be even more disastrous: surrender, defeat, apocalypse now. So we must stay the surge. Like the war's rollout in 2002, the new propaganda offensive to extend and escalate the war will be exquisitely timed to both the anniversary of 9/11 and a high-stakes Congressional vote (the Pentagon appropriations bill). General Petraeus and Mr. Crocker wouldn't be sounding like the Bobbsey Twins and laying out this coordinated rhetorical groundwork were they not already anticipating the surge's failure. Both spoke on Sunday of how (in General Petraeus's variation on the theme) they had to ``show that the Baghdad clock can indeed move a bit faster, so that you can put a bit of time back on the Washington clock.'' The very premise is nonsense. Yes, there is a Washington clock, tied to Republicans' desire to avoid another Democratic surge on Election Day 2008. But there is no Baghdad clock. It was blown up long ago and is being no more successfully reconstructed than anything else in Iraq. When Mr. Bush announced his ``new way forward'' in January, he offered a bouquet of promises, all unfulfilled today. ``Let the Iraqis lead'' was the policy's first bullet point, but in the initial assault on insurgents now playing out so lethally in Diyala Province, Iraqi forces were kept out of the fighting altogether. They were added on Thursday: 500 Iraqis, following 2,500 Americans. The notion that these Shiite troops might ``hold'' this Sunni area once the Americans leave is an opium dream. We're already back fighting in Maysan, a province whose security was officially turned over to Iraqi authorities in April. In his January prime-time speech announcing the surge, Mr. Bush also said that ``America will hold the Iraqi government to the benchmarks it has announced.'' More fiction. Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's own political adviser, Sadiq al- Rikabi, says it would take ``a miracle'' to pass the legislation America wants. Asked on Monday whether the Iraqi Parliament would stay in Baghdad this summer rather than hightail it to vacation, Tony Snow was stumped. Like Mr. Crocker and General Petraeus, Mr. Snow is on script for trivializing September as judgment day for the surge, saying that by then we'll only ``have a little bit of metric'' to measure success. This administration has a peculiar metric system. On Thursday, Peter Pace, the departing chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, called the spike in American troop deaths last week the ``wrong metric'' for assessing the surge's progress. No doubt other metrics in official reports this month are worthless too, as far as the non-reality-based White House is concerned. The civilian casualty rate is at an all-time high; the April-May American death toll is a new two-month record; overall violence in Iraq is up; only 146 out of 457 Baghdad neighborhoods are secure; the number of internally displaced Iraqis has quadrupled since January. Last week Iraq rose to No. 2 in Foreign Policy magazine's Failed State Index, barely nosing out Sudan. It might have made No. 1 if the Iraqi health ministry had not stopped providing a count of civilian casualties. Or if the Pentagon were not withholding statistics on the increase of attacks on the Green Zone. Apparently the White House is working overtime to ensure that the September ``snapshot'' of Iraq will be an underexposed blur. David Carr of The Times discovered that the severe Pentagon blackout on images of casualties now extends to memorials for the fallen in Iraq, even when a unit invites press coverage. Americans and Iraqis know the truth anyway. The question now is: What will be the new new way forward? For the administration, the way forward will include, as always, attacks on its critics' patriotism. We got a particularly absurd taste of that this month when Harry Reid was slammed for calling General Pace incompetent and accusing General Petraeus of exaggerating progress on the ground. General Pace's record speaks for itself; the administration declined to go to the mat in the Senate for his reappointment. As for General Petraeus, who recently spoke of ``astonishing signs of normalcy'' in Baghdad, he is nothing if not consistent. He first hyped ``optimism'' and ``momentum'' in Iraq in an op-ed article in September 2004. Come September 2007, Mr. Bush will offer his usual false choices. We must either stay his disastrous course in eternal pursuit of ``victory'' or retreat to the apocalypse of ``precipitous withdrawal.'' But by the latest of the president's ever-shifting definitions of victory, we've already lost. ``Victory will come,'' he says, when Iraq ``is stable enough to be able to be an ally in the war on terror and to govern itself and defend itself.'' The surge, which he advertised as providing ``breathing space'' for the Iraqi ``unity'' government to get its act together, is tipping that government into collapse. As Vali Nasr, author of ``The Shia Revival,'' has said, the new American strategy of arming Sunni tribes is tantamount to saying the Iraqi government is irrelevant. For the Bush White House, the real definition of victory has become ``anything they can get away with without taking blame for defeat,'' said the retired Army Gen. William Odom, a national security official in the Reagan and Carter administrations, when I spoke with him recently. The plan is to run out the Washington clock between now and Jan. 20, 2009, no matter the cost. Precipitous withdrawal is also a chimera, since American manpower, materiel and bases, not to mention our new Vatican City-sized embassy, can't be drawn down overnight. The only real choice, as everyone knows, is an orderly plan for withdrawal that will best serve American interests. The real debate must be over what that plan is. That debate can't happen as long as the White House gets away with falsifying reality, sliming its opponents and sowing hyped fears of Armageddon. The threat that terrorists in civil-war-torn Iraq will follow us home if we leave is as bogus as Saddam's mushroom clouds. The Qaeda that actually attacked us on 9/11 still remains under the tacit protection of our ally, Pakistan. As General Odom says, the endgame will start ``when a senior senator from the president's party says no,'' much as William Fulbright did to L.B.J. during Vietnam. That's why in Washington this fall, eyes will turn once again to John Warner, the senior Republican with the clout to give political cover to other members of his party who want to leave Iraq before they're forced to evacuate Congress. In September, it will be nearly a year since Mr. Warner said that Iraq was ``drifting sideways'' and that action would have to be taken ``if this level of violence is not under control and this government able to function.'' Mr. Warner has also signaled his regret that he was not more outspoken during Vietnam. ``We kept surging in those years,'' he told The Washington Post in January, as the Iraq surge began. ``It didn't work.'' Surely he must recognize that his moment for speaking out about this war is overdue. Without him, the Democrats don't have the votes to force the president's hand. With him, it's a slam dunk. The best way to honor the sixth anniversary of 9/11 will be to at last disarm a president who continues to squander countless lives in the names of those voiceless American dead. The truth about September will be that the President is still losing the Iraq war, but that's not what we will be told, nor will the President tell the American people that he has no plan to treat all the gravely wounded soldiers returning from Iraq. Already America has lost over 3,500 soldiers, as many as 53,000 more are gravely wounded. As many as 50,000 more may yet be afflicted with post traumatic stress disorder or traumatic brain injury. As the Associated Press reported over the weekend, our government is overwhelmed now in trying to care for our wounded, and the President has this Nation on course to see 20,000 more casualties before he leaves office. That's what will happen unless his own Republican Party finally tells him and the American people the truth about Iraq, and the urgent need to get their soldiers out of harm's way. The Vietnam Memorial in Washington is a place where we commemorate the soldiers who died during the last failed war. Had enough people gotten through to the President back in 1968, there would only be one side of that Memorial because we could have saved at least 25,000 lives. That's why we have to get through to the President today. The American people can't, the Democratic Party can't, even the Iraq Parliament can't. That leaves own the Republican Party to stop the memorial to Iraq's fallen heroes from growing any larger than it already will be. We have a chance today to save U.S. lives by seeing the Iraq war for what it is and what it isn't. It is a civil war created by us, and it isn't in America's interest to be there. Bring the soldiers home, Mr. President.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Madam Speaker, one of the great strengths of this country is the willingness of its people to give back. We each find our own way to be ``participant citizens.'' On the occasion of the honoring of his lifetime achievement by one of Seattle's great historic organizations, the Rainier Club, the people of the State of Washington would like to hold up as a national inspiration the special record of one of our State's most notable participant citizens, the distinguished and award-winning actor/director/writer and, just as proudly, teacher, Tom Skerritt. Thanks to Tom Skerritt and great artists like him, Seattle has become a great cutting edge in the forward movement of the performing arts. Its stage innovation has been recognized with Tony Award celebration, including for work in which he participated. And now, in little over 3 years, Mr. Skerritt has created in Seattle a new approach to the teaching and doing of movie-making through his acclaimed the Film School. To find the artist, to find the teacher, first you find the man. Tom Skerritt's skills are matched by his unique and innate embodiment of the finest American traits of decency, humanity, strength, humor and integrity, as witness his starring performances in the deeply loved series ``Picket Fences,'' for which he won the Emmy among other honors, ``M.A.S.H.,'' ``Alien,'' ``Top Gun,'' ``A River Runs Through It,'' ``The Turning Point,'' ``Steel Magnolias,'' ``Contact,'' and the remake of ``High Noon.'' Who other than Tom Skerritt could have complemented the portrayal of stand-up American heroism first conveyed by Gary Cooper. Seattle and the State of Washington hold Tom Skerritt up to the Nation with pride because he is the kind of stand-up hero/humanist he so often and so powerfully portrays. This can best be illustrated by the last and least known of his hyphenated talents alluded to above: Tom Skerritt, teacher. His special brand of give-back to the country and people he loves is his unique ability to perpetuate and to inspire the study of that extraordinarily modem art form so influenced by its practice in America, motion pictures. One of the significant developments in movie-making in recent decades is that the heart of movie-making, so long associated with and conducted in Hollywood, has now spread out to other parts of the country. The American art form is now an all America art form. And few cities have taken a more active and creative part in this transition, this creative development and envelopment, than the area of Seattle. A key leader in this evolution has been that master of all movie trades, Tom Skerritt. He is most widely regarded as an actor par excellence, an Emmy winner and an artist of acclaim in film, on television, and on the stage. He has been active in passing his emotive skills to young performers. But it is his passion to teach motion picture creation innovatively that has won for his 3-year-old school, appropriately titled the Film School, a pre-eminence and a very special niche. Together with Oscar-winning writer Stuart Stem and such top-of- their-craft creative artists as John Jacobsen, Warren Etheredge, and Rick Stevenson, Skerritt has made the Film School an institution of learning that has broken the mold and has set exciting new high bars for the teaching of film-making as the art of communicated ideas. The people of Seattle and the State of Washington celebrate Tom Skerritt as an example of how an artist or any person can devise his or her own special way to be a participant citizen. Tom Skerritt inspires each of us to find a personal way to pass along the fervor, dedication and skill that allows us to contribute to a better and more integrated society and to experience the joy of giving back to our country, our resident city and to the wisest application of our profession. Seattle proudly lays claim to an artist who is at the top of the role model list. Not just his genuine human depth and caring, but the brilliance and natural belief he brings to every one of his acclaimed performances. Thanks to Tom Skerritt and his associates in the Film School, Seattle is becoming a major center for instilling the skills of film art and the joy of that great American spawned art form.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I was raised in a fundamentalist Christian home that cast a dim view on gambling. I didn't care for it much then, and I don't care for it now. While the Bible never directly uses the word ``gambling,'' there are plenty of references to it in Scripture, and none of them are very kind. Still, from lotteries to casinos, gambling is part of the American scene today. Across the country, governments derive revenue from gambling that flows into public coffers. Whether you call it a sin tax or self-imposed tax, it helps fund good social programs. Today, gambling has migrated online where it is unregulated, off shore and exporting billions of U.S. dollars. Basically, we have a Wild West show with few protections for Americans against fraud, underage gambling and privacy. My colleagues, Barney Frank and Peter King, have introduced legislation to establish some order and law online with licensing and regulation. I am introducing a companion bill today that establishes the process to collect some of the gambling revenue online just as we do in the communities. If we decide as a Nation to enable gambling online, the billions of dollars flowing out of this country should remain here to help us fund schools and bridges and a host of social programs that need more than luck to succeed.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, a lot of political figures, myself included, have talked about the Iraq war. Tonight I want to share the words expressed by people in this and other wars. They come from a new book called ``Voices in Wartime.'' It contains profoundly moving and often poetic thoughts from brave U.S. soldiers, loved ones and Iraqis. This is from John Henry Parker, a Marine Corps veteran and Executive Director of Veterans and Families. ``My son is a sergeant in the 10th Mountain Division. He was a squad leader, and his job was to go into the border towns and into the different mountain areas around the Pakistan border to seek out and find the enemy, the Taliban, al Qaeda, and whoever else might be hiding in the hills resisting. ``He had been witnessing a lot of really horrific things, and his main concern was, can I come back and just get past all of this and be a dad, a husband, and just a family guy? How do you do that?'' Dr. Enas Mohamed is an Iraqi doctor now living in Seattle, my Congressional district. She lived in Baghdad during the First Gulf War and said this in the book: ``The children were really scared and kept yelling. It was winter, and so, at 5 a.m., there wasn't much sunlight. It was dark, and the bombing continued. Everybody felt a deep fear in their bones. ``You can't imagine the amount of disease that has spread since the war. One of the largest issues is polluted water. It causes dysentery, cholera, typhoid, and there's a deficiency of water, so we don't have enough water to wash our hands every time they get dirty. ``Children play together all the time, and they don't take the precautions like adults do. Plus, they have weaker immune systems and malnutrition or not enough food to fill their needs as growing kids. ``With the low level of hygiene and the high level of malnutrition, any infection will start to grow and transmit very quickly. ``One of the victims was a very, very hard case for me. He was 10 or 11 years old. I talked to his mom and learned his history. He left school to support his family, so he was on his way to sell some cigarettes near the street where a car bomb exploded. This little child got broken hands and broken legs. ``The doctor told me they might have to amputate one of his legs, and I can't imagine what it means for a 10-year-old boy to live with one limb. He didn't even get enough time to finish school or to play soccer or to do all the activities like little boys do. ``I think it's time to stop it and do something really positive for these innocent people. If we think about the new generation, starting with the boy I mentioned before, you can imagine a whole generation of disabled people. They have and been punished for doing nothing. They're innocent civilians who are just hoping to live like any other human being on earth.'' Sheila Sebron is a disabled African American Air Force veteran. She wrote this. ``PTSD is not to be taken lightly. It's a devastating illness that robs its victims of free will and imposes a slow death sentence that kills the human spirit. ``I get caught in these loops in my mind and get stuck thinking about part of a thought without being able to finish the thought. Thanks to finally getting the treatment I needed for my PTSD, I can now break the cycle of being trapped in my mind and can communicate verbally.'' She also writes, ``War harms everyone it touches: soldiers, civilians, refugees, family members and friends. No one escapes the trauma.'' Personally, I was a medical doctor, a psychiatrist and a Navy veteran who treated combat soldiers returning from Vietnam. Sheila Sebron is right. No one escapes without trauma. But there is hope, and treatment is available for PTSD. I've never met Sheila Sebron, but I'm very proud of her. She's a brave U.S. soldier who put her life on the line twice for her country, once in uniform, and now in print as she tries to tell others and save them by telling her story. PTSD harmed many serving in Vietnam and in the First Gulf War. But as many as 50,000 soldiers serving in the Iraq war will come home with PTSD. PTSD is a mental wound as real and as serious as a shrapnel wound from an IED. Soldiers need and deserve our help and support. The book is called, Voices in Wartime. I urge every American to pick up a copy and read it.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, there is hardly anyone asking the right question at this time, and it is whether the U.S. involvement in Iraq will end as it did in Vietnam or last forever as it has in Korea. Last week, the President declared his intention to keep America in Iraq forever. That's a sure sign the President's been talking to the Vice President again. Iraq looks nothing like Korea did in 1952. There is no DMZ and no 38th parallel separating the opposing forces. In Iraq, the war is everywhere. In Korea, the DMZ is one of South Korea's most popular tourist destinations, with buses hauling people back and forth. It's so popular you have to book the trip weeks in advance. It costs $42, by the way, and that's without lunch. At the DMZ, you can visit the small building where an armistice was signed, and risk stepping across a painted line on the floor separating North and South Korea, which remain technically at war. Is this the President's vision of Iraq? Hardly, but that's what he would like the American people to believe. It sounds so simple and so safe and so utterly detached from Iraq, where every street corner in Baghdad is a war zone. The President wants an indefinite military presence in Iraq, but a majority of the Iraq parliament signed a petition demanding a timetable for the U.S. to leave, which the President ignores. The President wants permanent military bases in Iraq despite the thoughtful and bipartisan conclusion of the Iraq Study Group. That group said, ``The United States can begin to shape a positive climate for its diplomatic efforts internationally and within Iraq, through public statements by President Bush that reject the notion that the United States seeks to control Iraq's oil or seeks permanent bases within Iraq.'' But the President rejected their common sense and ordered the base building to go forward. What exactly are we protecting with the Iraqi people fleeing by the millions? South Korea never looked like this. In Iraq, students graduating from college used to dream about getting a good job and raising a family. Now they dream of getting out of Iraq alive and as quickly as possible. Just today, the United Nations issued a new report that says 4.2 million Iraqis have been displaced, half driven out of their homes by rampant and unrelenting bloodshed, and the other fleeing the country. It's estimated by the U.N. that 30,000 Iraqis cross into Syria every month, and Syria says the actual number is much higher. Jordan, meanwhile, has already taken over 1 million Iraqis. What have we done? We have granted 701 Iraqi refugees asylum in the United States. The President recently announced we're willing to accept up to 7,000 Iraqis. Over 2 million Iraqis have fled their homeland so far, and we're going to take in a few thousand. When we left Vietnam, we took hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese with us. Within a few months 130,000 Vietnamese had resettled here, and within a few years the number topped 320,000. These were our Vietnamese friends, people who had risked their lives to help us in Vietnam. We didn't desert them and they didn't desert us. In Iraq, the President says we're willing to take a few thousand in a Nation losing millions of its people. The Iraqi people are fleeing their homes and their homeland in increasing numbers, flooding into nearby countries unable to cope with the refugee crisis. Millions of peaceful, law-abiding Iraqis from its intellectual establishment, to its merchants, professionals, civil servants, and ordinary citizens are doing whatever they can to leave. And the President is doing everything he can to stay, building bases and demanding a so-called law to gain access to Iraqi's oil. The President's stay-the-course strategy has evolved into his stay forever strategy. It hasn't worked before and it won't work now. The President's military escalation is an absolute failure, and the sooner the President admits his mistake, the faster we can develop a national exit plan that protects our soldiers and gives Iraq back to the Iraq people, no strings or military bases attached. Mr. Speaker, please pass the message to our President. It's time to bring the troops home. A hundred a month are dying, more and more. Last month, the third highest month in the war. It's not getting better. We've got to bring the troops home.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, the American people want U.S. soldiers out of Iraq. A majority of Iraq's elected Parliament want U.S. soldiers out of Iraq. And I want soldiers out of Iraq, out of harm's way and out of the middle of a civil war. This is what the American people elected us to do in November, knowing the best way to support our troops is to protect our soldiers and get them out of Iraq. Since January, 431 U.S. soldiers have died in Iraq; 83 American soldiers died in January, 80 died in February, 81 died in March, 104 died in April, and 83 Americans have died in Iraq so far in May. Since January, 2,496 U.S. soldiers have been wounded in Iraq. In fewer than 5 months, the U.S. casualties in Iraq is already exceeding the number of soldiers who died or were wounded in Iraq in 2003. But the President insists we're winning. The reality is his stubbornness and intransigence has lost the war and the peace. Outside my office, we honor the fallen heroes of the State of Washington by showing the photographs of 78 men and women killed in Iraq. Adding more pictures will not sustain their memory. We honor these fallen heroes only by protecting the living. The way forward is not more casualties, as the President freely admits will occur. The way forward in Iraq is not claiming phony ties to 9/11, fake intelligence, or outright fabrication, although these are the trademarks of this administration. Demanding a timetable to get our soldiers out of Iraq, as I have done repeatedly, is the strongest support anyone in this Congress or country can do to support our soldiers. I voted today to support U.S. soldiers by voting against a bill that approves an endless war and provides the President with a box of preapproved blank checks. A Nation does not support its soldiers by accepting more Americans killed and wounded in Iraq while carrying out the flawed mission of a failed presidency. The Congress does not support our soldiers by passing flawed legislation that supports a President who is totally out of touch with reality. Spending more money in Iraq without a timetable to get out of Iraq only buys more casualties in a needless military disaster ordered by a President who can mislead, but not lead, America in war or peace. The invasion of Iraq was and is all about oil. The one and only benchmark that matters to the President is for Iraq to pass an American-engineered oil law that delivers the oil wealth of Iraq into the hands of Western oil companies. The President would not listen when a majority of Iraq's parliament signed a petition last week demanding a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. forces. That's because it doesn't matter what they think; only what the President and his neocon friends want. And they want oil. They want it so much that the President will keep the U.S. soldiers in Iraq until he can strong arm the passage of a law that provides cover for Western oil companies to control Iraq's vast oil wealth. That is the President's definition of mission accomplished. The American people elected us to stand up to a President who is out of touch and out of control. Over 3,000 U.S. casualties ago, we were handed the gavel to lead against the President who had taken his Republican majority in Congress to suspend the coequal branch of government. The President issued orders, and the Republicans bowed their heads and complied. We must lead, not capitulate. American soldiers will never be safe as long as the President can order a military escalation in one breath and, in the next, predict growing casualties. The Iraq people will never be free so long as the President has the freedom to occupy their Nation. The American people will never be served as long as the President can go it alone in Iraq and in the halls of Congress. The American people gave us a mission, but on this day, we have failed in that mission.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, the President and the Vice President have vowed to repeat the mistakes of history, and they have put into motion a plan to do just that in Iran, even as the House is about to send the President a box of blank checks for Iraq against the will of the American people. History is worth noting. In 1953, the United States and the United Kingdom launched Operation Ajax, a covert CIA operation to destabilize and remove the democratically elected Government of Iran, including Prime Minister Mossadegh. Why? Oil. Under Mossadegh, the Iranian Government decided to reclaim Iran's rightful ownership to its national oil treasure, which had been exclusively controlled by the British, who were taking 85 percent of the profits. Oh, by the way, the United Kingdom also kept the books secret, merely telling Iran what its 15 percent take was. As soon as Mossadegh began to reclaim Iran's oil, it was all over. Operation Ajax was set into motion. The U.S. Embassy in Tehran provoked phony and internal Iranian dissent, while the Brits engineered an Iranian financial crisis by orchestrating a global boycott of Iranian oil. We brought down the Iranian Government and installed the Shah. For two decades we propped him up against the will of the Iranian people. It was all about controlling Iran. It still is. Today ABC News is reporting exclusively that this President has authorized a new covert CIA plot to bring down the Iranian Government. I ask to submit for the Record the report produced by the chief investigative reporter Brian Ross and Richard Esposito of ABC News. This is the lead sentence in their story: ``The CIA has received secret Presidential approval to mount a covert `black' operation to destabilize the Iranian Government, current and former officials in the Intelligence Community tell the Blotter on ABCNews.com.'' [From ABC News, May 22, 2007] Bush Authorizes New Covert Action Against Iran (By Brian Ross and Richard Esposito) The CIA has received secret presidential approval to mount a covert ``black'' operation to destabilize the Iranian government, current and former officials in the intelligence community tell the Blotter on ABCNews.com. The sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the subject, say President Bush has signed a ``nonlethal presidential finding'' that puts into motion a CIA plan that reportedly includes a coordinated campaign of propaganda, disinformation and manipulation of Iran's currency and international financial transactions. ``I can't confirm or deny whether such a program exists or whether the president signed it, but it would be consistent with an overall American approach trying to find ways to put pressure on the regime,'' said Bruce Riedel, a recently retired CIA senior official who dealt with Iran and other countries in the region. A National Security Council spokesperson, Gordon Johndroe, said, ``The White House does not comment on intelligence matters.'' A CIA spokesperson said, ``As a matter of course, we do not comment on allegations of covert activity.'' The sources say the CIA developed the covert plan over the last year and received approval from White House officials and other officials in the intelligence community. Officials say the covert plan is designed to pressure Iran to stop its nuclear enrichment program and end aid to insurgents in Iraq. ``There are some channels where the United States government may want to do things without its hand showing, and legally, therefore, the administration would, if it's doing that, need an intelligence finding and would need to tell the Congress,'' said ABC News consultant Richard Clarke, a former White House counterterrorism official. Current and former intelligence officials say the approval of the covert action means the Bush administration, for the time being, has decided not to pursue a military option against Iran. Vice President Cheney helped to lead the side favoring a military strike,'' said former CIA official Riedel, ``but I think they have come to the conclusion that a military strike has more downsides than upsides.'' The covert action plan comes as U.S. officials have confirmed Iran had dramatically increased its ability to produce nuclear weapons material, at a pace that experts said would give them the ability to build a nuclear bomb in two years. Riedel says economic pressure on Iran may be the most effective tool available to the CIA, particularly in going after secret accounts used to fund the nuclear program. ``The kind of dealings that the Iranian Revolution Guards are going to do, in terms of purchasing nuclear and missile components, are likely to be extremely secret, and you're going to have to work very, very hard to find them, and that's exactly the kind of thing the CIA's nonproliferation center and others would be expert at trying to look into,'' Riedel said. Under the law, the CIA needs an official presidential finding to carry out such covert actions. The CIA is permitted to mount covert ``collection'' operations without a presidential finding. ``Presidential findings'' are kept secret but reported to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and other key congressional leaders. The ``nonlethal'' aspect of the presidential finding means CIA officers may not use deadly force in carrying out the secret operations against Iran. Still, some fear that even a nonlethal covert CIA program carries great risks. ``I think everybody in the region knows that there is a proxy war already afoot with the United States supporting anti-Iranian elements in the region as well as opposition groups within Iran,'' said Vali Nasr, adjunct senior fellow for Mideast studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. ``And this covert action is now being escalated by the new U.S. directive, and that can very quickly lead to Iranian retaliation and a cycle of escalation can follow,'' Nasr said. Other ``lethal'' findings have authorized CIA covert actions against al Qaeda, terrorism and nuclear proliferation. Also briefed on the CIA proposal, according to intelligence sources, were National Security Advisor Steve Hadley and Deputy National Security Advisor Elliott Abrams. ``The entire plan has been blessed by Abrams, in particular,'' said one intelligence source familiar with the plan. ``And Hadley had to put his chop on it.'' Abrams' last involvement with attempting to destabilize a foreign government led to criminal charges. He pleaded guilty in October 1991 to two misdemeanor counts of withholding information from Congress about the Reagan administration's ill-fated efforts to destabilize the Nicaraguan Sandinista government in Central America, known as the IranContra affair. Abrams was later pardoned by President George H. W. Bush in December 1992. In June 2001, Abrams was named by then National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice to head the National Security Council's office for democracy, human rights and international operations. On Feb. 2, 2005, National Security Advisor Hadley appointed Abrams deputy assistant to the president and deputy national security advisor for global democracy strategy, one of the nation's most senior national security positions. As earlier reported on the Blotter on ABCNews.com, the United States has supported and encouraged an Iranian militant group, Jundullah, that has conducted deadly raids inside Iran from bases on the rugged Iran-Pakistan- Afghanistan ``tri-border region.'' U.S. officials deny any ``direct funding'' of Jundullah groups but say the leader of Jundullah was in regular contact with U.S. officials. American intelligence sources say Jundullah has received money and weapons through the Afghanistan and Pakistan military and Pakistan's intelligence service. Pakistan has officially denied any connection. A report broadcast on Iranian TV last Sunday said Iranian authorities had captured 10 men crossing the border with $500,000 in cash along with ``maps of sensitive areas'' and ``modem spy equipment.'' A senior Pakistani official told ABCNews.com the 10 men were members of Jundullah. The leader of the Jundullah group, according to the Pakistani official, has been recruiting and training ``hundreds of men'' for ``unspecified missions'' across the border in Iran. We are back in 1953, and it worked so well then. Of course, the Vice President wanted to invade Iran, so we can be sure he will spin new tales of fear in coming days to keep his preferred option, invasion, by land or by air, very much alive. The President knows only one way: My way or the highway. His Vice President knows only one way: Invade and seize control of what you want. And he wants the oil treasure of Iraq and Iran to become wholly owned subsidiaries of the Western oil companies he favors. With Iraq in civil war, the President has authorized a secret plan to repeat the doomed mistakes of history in Iran. How many billion dollars of reconstruction money from Iraq will be siphoned off to deconstruct Iran? The American people are virtually shouting at us to pay attention and get our soldiers out of Iraq now. Vast sums of U.S. money are flowing into Iraq, and billions of U.S. dollars are missing. The Special Investigator for Iraq Reconstruction told a San Antonio newspaper last week that corruption in Iraq is endemic and debilitating. But Prime Minister Maliki has granted Ministers and former Ministers immunity from prosecution by Iraq's Commission of Public Integrity, and, in turn, the Ministers can shield their own employees from prosecution, a government that has been told by this President and Vice President to pass an oil law that transfers control and profits to Western oil companies, just like the good old days in Iran. Overthrowing Iran in 1953 was all about oil. Invading Iraq was all about oil, and the new secret plot against Iran is all about oil. Oil is the only benchmark this President and Vice President want, and they will keep American soldiers fighting and dying until an oil law is passed in Iraq that gives Western oil companies total control of the spigot and the profits. It's time to unmask the latest doomed plot to overthrow Iran, and it is past time to get our soldiers out of Iraq. Nothing less than protecting our troops is acceptable.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, many of my friends ask me as we struggle to fund this war, why are the Iraqi Parliamentarians going on a 2-month vacation? The answer is very simple: Self-preservation. The AP reported that ``a few shells'' fell in the Green Zone last weekend. Well, my sources in Amman and in Baghdad told me that 47 mortar rounds landed in the Green Zone on Sunday, and on Monday they hit the parliament building, destroying the office of Dr. Mashhadani 5 minutes after he left it. The AP also reports that the Defense Minister, Mr. Obeidi, has told reporters that Iraq's military was drawing up plans in case U.S. forces left the country quickly. ``The army plans on the basis of a worst case scenario so as not to allow any security vacuum. There are meetings with political leaders on how we can deal with the sudden pullout.'' It sounds to me like we are looking at off-the-hotel-roof in Vietnam, or maybe it was the pullout from Beirut. I wish, Mr. Speaker, we could make the President be honest with us about what he is actually planning. The world can't figure it out.

Mr. McDERMOTT

Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, in recent months, the American people have been riveted by the disclosure surrounding the firing of eight U.S. Attorneys, including John McKay of my hometown of Seattle. The other day, the number two person at the Justice Department testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Even in jaded Washington, D.C., the revelations were so shocking that the Washington Post published an editorial, which I submit for printing in the Record. Let me read part of it. ``James B. Comey, the straight-as-an-arrow former number two official of the Justice Department, yesterday offered the Senate Judiciary Committee an account of Bush administration lawlessness so shocking it would have been unbelievable coming from a less reputable source.'' The American people understand that political appointees are a fact of life when a new President takes office, but the American people demand that competence and integrity overrule political party affiliation. The Justice Department has thousands of dedicated public servants who know what it means to be respected and uphold the law. And then there is Gonzalez. The revelations began over the firing of eight U.S. Attorneys. Now there is a new revelation about Gonzalez trying to force the previous Attorney General to agree to anything the White House wanted. What else don't we know? For the last 6 years, congressional oversight was nonexistent. What cases were priorities and what cases were not? And why not? What did and did not happen following the murder of an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Seattle? My friend, Tom Wales, had been the Assistant U.S. Attorney in Seattle under the previous administration. He was a well-respected law enforcement officer known for his pursuit of white color criminals. He was also a vocal and strong advocate for gun control. Tom was shot and killed in his home while working at his computer one late night in October. If Tom was killed, as some suspect, because of those he brought to justice, then he died in the line of duty. No one has ever been charged, although there are news accounts that indicate authorities have a prime suspect. Now there is a new suspicion. Did the White House want its appointee in Seattle, John McKay, fired in part because he was vigorously pursuing the Tom Wales case? Someone sent me a blog recently asking the same fundamental question: Why would Justice not throw every available resource into finding Tom's killer? Why would they not want the investigation by their own U.S. Attorney in Seattle to proceed with every possible resource? Some bloggers say it is all because of Tom's advocacy for gun control, but the answer may be tragically simpler. Maybe Gonzalez wanted the Republican U.S. Attorney appointee in Seattle to spend all his time on something else; to find or, if necessary, invent voter fraud in a close Washington governor's race, narrowly won by the Democrat. Could they have been that arrogant, that uncaring about the death of a good man, an Assistant U.S. Attorney? Most people would have dismissed that notion until recently. Now the revelations about the Attorney General and the attitude he took toward cases, perhaps including the murder of a Federal officer in Seattle, cannot be adequately described by words like shocking. At this point, I believe there are two necessary mandatory actions that must be taken. The Attorney General must go, now. His allegiance to partisan political interests above his oath to uphold the laws of the United States is outrageous. Secondly, even if it requires the appointment of an outside independent prosecutor, the Justice Department should immediately, vigorously and conclusively investigate the murder of Tom Wales and not stop until the killer is charged and brought to justice. We owe that to Tom Wales, his family, and every law enforcement officer who risks his or her life every day in service to the American people. [From the Washington Post, May 16, 2007] Mr. Comey's Tale: A Standoff at a Hospital Bedside Speaks Volumes About Attorney General Gonzales James B. Comey, the straight-as-an-arrow former No. 2 official at the Justice Department, yesterday offered the Senate Judiciary Committee an account of Bush administration lawlessness so shocking it would have been unbelievable coming from a less reputable source. The episode involved a 2004 nighttime visit to the hospital room of then-Attorney General John D. Ashcroft by Alberto Gonzales, then the White House counsel, and Andrew H. Card Jr., then the White House chief of staff. Only the broadest outlines of this visit were previously known: that Mr. Comey, who was acting as attorney general during Mr. Ashcroft's illness, had refused to recertify the legality of the administration's warrantless wiretapping program; that Mr. Gonzales and Mr. Card had tried to do an end-run around Mr. Comey; that Mr. Ashcroft had rebuffed them. Mr. Comey's vivid depiction, worthy of a Hollywood script, showed the lengths to which the administration and the man who is now attorney general were willing to go to pursue the surveillance program. First, they tried to coerce a man in intensive care--a man so sick he had transferred the reins of power to Mr. Comey--to grant them legal approval. Having failed, they were willing to defy the conclusions of the nation's chief law enforcement officer and pursue the surveillance without Justice's authorization. Only in the face of the prospect of mass resignations--Mr. Comey, FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III and most likely Mr. Ashcroft himself--did the president back down. As Mr. Comey testified, ``I couldn't stay, if the administration was going to engage in conduct that the Department of Justice had said had no legal basis.'' The crisis was averted only when, the morning after the program was reauthorized without Justice's approval, President Bush agreed to fix whatever problem Justice had with it (the details remain classified). ``We had the president's direction to do . . . what the Justice Department believed was necessary to put this matter on a footing where we could certify to its legality,'' Mr. Comey said. The dramatic details should not obscure the bottom line: the administration's alarming willingness, championed by, among others, Vice President Cheney and his counsel, David Addington, to ignore its own lawyers. Remember, this was a Justice Department that had embraced an expansive view of the president's inherent constitutional powers, allowing the administration to dispense with following the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Justice's conclusions are supposed to be the final word in the executive branch about what is lawful or not, and the administration has emphasized since the warrantless wiretapping story broke that it was being done under the department's supervision. Now, it emerges, they were willing to override Justice if need be. That Mr. Gonzales is now in charge of the department he tried to steamroll may be most disturbing of all.