Cynthia McKinney

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take the time of the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio).

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to join in the remarks of my colleague about the intensity of feeling that we have for the people of Louisiana and Mississippi and Alabama and, of course, Florida on the first stop of Hurricane Katrina and the situation that has unfolded literally before our very eyes. I should also take a moment to commend the journalists who have facilitated us being able to see what has unfolded. Part of what has unfolded is sheer incompetence on the part of this administration, and the feelings that the people are experiencing result from the fact that we have an administration who let the American people down, who let the people in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida down, and just will not say We let you down. We made a mistake. They, instead, try to defend the indefensible. Part of the late response comes from the fact that 40 percent of the Mississippi National Guard are in Iraq; 35 percent for those of Louisiana are in Iraq; 26 percent of the Florida National Guard are in Iraq; and 23 percent of the Alabama National Guard are in Iraq. I have seen the interviews that have been done by Aaron Broussard of Jefferson Parish and Malik Rahim in New Orleans proper. Aaron Broussard said, ``We have been abandoned by our own country.'' Investigative journalists sent information to me that Customs' Blackhawk helicopter pilots were livid because they were not allowed to rescue people. And then in the matter of attitude, and of course, I will be speaking more at length on this on Thursday in a 1-hour special order, but in attitude, FEMA Chief Michael Brown had the nerve to say, No one was clairvoyant enough to foresee this happening. But there have been studies, there have been articles, and this is his job to foresee this happening. I have got articles from National Geographic and Scientific American all saying exactly what happened and what we witnessed unfolding. And then he had the unmitigated gall to say that people must take some responsibility. Well, Mr. Brown, you need to take responsibility. And, Mr. Bush, you need to take responsibility. The Times-Picayune has called for Mr. Brown's firing, and I have to say that they are absolutely correct. And I would just like to ask this administration to just admit that they messed up instead of appearing before the American people with all kinds of excuses about what they did and what they did not do, and we are not going to revisit the past, we are going to make sure we move forward or we look forward. There are a million people who have been affected by this, dispersed all over our country. The State of Georgia has received and is receiving thousands of them. The Fourth Congressional District is receiving as many of them as we can. The City of Atlanta has opened its arms to the victims of this administration. With interest, I note, on the State Department Web site, that they provide us a clue as to when we are seeing misinformation, and what they tell us is that we are being misinformed when we are being told something that is clearly not true. What the administration has said to us tonight, in many instances, is clearly untrue. And let me just say that it is unconscionable that the Secretary of Energy could stand before us tonight and say that he does not know how to bring down gas prices, which was the original reason that I asked for this 5 minutes tonight.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, Kenneth Samuel is a Godly man, and I thank him for being here today. He was born in Darlington, South Carolina, and received his B.A. from Wesleyan University, his Master's of Divinity from Emory University, and his Doctor of Ministry Degree from United Theological Seminary in Dayton, Ohio. Dr. Samuel was licensed as a minister and ordained at the historic Ebenezer Baptist Church of Atlanta, Georgia, the church of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Reverend Samuel believes that the church must be all around us and is not just reflected in a building. Toward that end, he has taken his ministry of social justice to the community at large. Reverend Samuel currently serves as the President of the DeKalb County NAACP. He has also served as President of the DeKalb County Council on Adult Literacy and has volunteered as a chaplain at the DeKalb County jail. He serves on the Board of Leadership DeKalb and chaplained the southern region of the Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity. In 1987 he organized the Victory for the World Church and Independent Baptist Church and United Church of Christ. Reverend Samuel's church serves the total person, providing spiritual development, educational enhancement, and physical fitness. The church school, Victory Christian Academy, Victory Annex, and the Kenneth L. Samuel Community Life Center define Victory as a church that serves its members and the larger community. Reverend Samuel is a wonderful leader in our community, a strong man unafraid to take a stand, and I am proud to have him lead us in prayer today in our community, the United States Congress.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Chairman, I rise because the racial disparity in unemployment, median family income, average household net worth, over- 65 poverty rate, and infant mortality is not decreasing, it is increasing.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, last month I was able to do a Special Order thanks to the minority leader and her staff who have secured time so that I can come on to the House floor and address this Congress and the leadership of this Congress and the American people. Last month's Special Order, which is what these talks are called after legislative business has been dispensed with, was about a bus, the bus of opportunity. And it was a plea to the leaders of this Congress, to the leaders of this administration, to the leaders of this country to not allow Americans to be left behind as the bus of opportunity pulls off. I talked about the experience that I had with a little boy who was trying to catch a metro bus to school. And he yelled to me and I ran and I ran and I ran to catch up with that bus and I told the little boy, You can run. You can catch the bus. And we caught that bus as it idled at a red light. We pounded on the door. The bus driver nodded her recognition of my request to let the little boy board the bus, and then she shook her head no and drove away. The little boy was crushed, but he caught the next bus, and I assume he successfully made it to school. Then I talked about some statistics from leading organizations that keep them about the dire straits faced by too many Americans, and in particular too many African Americans. I showed these charts on imprisonment, the disparities that exist in our country. If you look at imprisonment, which is an indication of the status of justice in this country, it will take for the gap to close between the rates of imprisonment for African Americans and the rates of imprisonment for white Americans to close, it will take 190 years. For poverty, for the rate of poverty experienced by African Americans, to catch up to the rate of poverty experienced by white Americans it will take 150 years to close that gap if nothing is done in the area of public policy. Child poverty, 210 years to erase the gap of a large number of African American children who experience poverty. Income, 581 years to close the income gap experienced by African Americans in this country. And, finally, because the President talks about homeownership and the power of homeownership and how this budget that this Congress is now in the process of passing, is to promote homeownership in this country, sadly the rate of homeownership in the African American community pales in comparison to that experienced in the white community. It will take 1,664 years to close the homeownership gap if nothing is done. So I ask the leadership of this Congress to please pay attention to these statistics because these statistics represent real people. And despite what the Republicans say about us having a growth economy, the sad fact is that if we do nothing, too many Americans are being left behind, too many Americans. And so I ask that we leave no American behind. Mr. Speaker, in Iraq I ask the question tonight, are we leaving our soul behind? Who are we as a country? What have we become? Do the American people even care? What can we do to regain our soul? Mr. Speaker, I have noted on this floor that the snows of Kilimanjaro are melting, that the glaciers in the Arctic are melting, that we have real serious problems that the best minds in our country can devote their talent to solving. And I would like to read a quote from Dwight David Eisenhower about how we choose to spend our resources. He said, ``Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.'' President Eisenhower said that. Then John F. Kennedy in his inaugural address reminded us that the world is very different now for man, for man holds in his mortal hands the power to abolish all forms of human poverty and all forms of human life. Kennedy said, ``Finally, to those nations who would make themselves our adversary, we offer not a pledge but a request. That both sides begin anew the quest for peace before the dark powers of destruction released by science engulf all humanity in planned or accidental self-destruction.'' Planned or accidental self-destruction. Today I would like to do a rollcall, a rollcall of the young men and women who have died in Iraq from my home State of Georgia as compiled by my local newspaper on Monday, May 30. In addition, I would like to read a few articles and I would like to read those articles all with one question or one series of questions in mind: Who are we? What do we stand for? What is being done in our name? Is there a way out? I will begin to read Georgia's Memorial Day honor roll. Jamaal Addison, 22, died March 23, 2003; Diego Fernando Rincon, 19, died March 29, 2003; Wilbert Davis, age 40, died April 3, 2003; Edward J. Korn, 31, died April 3, 2003, David T. Nutt, 32, died May 14, 2003; John K. Klinesmith, Jr., died June 12, 2003; Michael Crockett, age 27, died July 24, 2003; Nathaniel Hart, Jr., age 29, died July 28, 2003; Bobby Franklin, age 38, died August 20, 2003; Benjamin Freeman, age 19, died October 13, 2003; Jerry Wilson, age 45, died November 23, 2003; Marshall Edgerton, age 27, died December 11, 2003; Christopher Holland, age 26, died December 17, 2003; Nathaniel Johnson, age 22, died January 8, 2004; Ricky Crockett, age 38, died January 12, 2004; Thomas Thigpen, age 52, died March 16, 2004; William R. Strange, age 19, died April 2, 2004; Justin Johnson, age 22, died April 10, 2004; Antoine Holt, age 20, died April 10, 2004; Marvin Camposiles, age 25, died April 17, 2004; Marquis Whitaker, age 20, died April 27, 2004; Christopher Dickerson, age 33, died April 30, 2004. Juan Lopez, age 22, died June 21, 2004. Tyler Brown, age 26, died September 14, 2004. Foster Pinkston, age 47, died September 16, 2004. Michael Scarborough, age 28, died October 30, 2004. Kelley Courtney, age 28, died October 30, 2004. Dan Malcom, Junior, age 25, died November 10, 2004. Jonathan Shields, 25, died November 12, 2004. Jeffrey Blanton, age 23, died December 12, 2004. Bennie J. Washington, age 25, died January 4, 2005. Jesus Fonseca, age 19, died January 17, 2005. David Salie, age 34, died February 14, 2005. Tyler Dickens, age 20, died April 12, 2005. John McGee, age 36, died May 2, 2005. Charles Gillican, the Third, age 35, died May 14, 2005. The sad fact, even sadder than the way I feel right now after having read those names, is that we may not even have the real story. We may not know the true costs of this war. I am told U.S. military personnel who died in German hospitals en route to German hospitals are not counted. So, in addition to the more than 1,000 Americans who have lost their lives in this war, there are an additional 6,210 who died in German hospitals or en route to those hospitals. Brian Harring writes in the Domestic Intelligence Reporter that the Bush administration has sworn up and down that it will never reinstate the draft. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, in an op-ed blaming conspiracy mongers for attempting to scare and mislead young Americans, insisted that the idea of reinstating the draft has never been debated, endorsed, discussed, theorized, pondered or even whispered by anyone in the Bush administration. However, in the Domestic Intelligence Reporter, Brian Harring writes that assertion is demonstrably false. According to an internal Selective Service memo made public under the Freedom of Information Act, the agency's acting director met with two of Rumsfeld's under secretaries in February, 2003, precisely to debate, discuss and ponder a return to the draft. The memo then proposes in detail that the Selective Service be reengineered to cover all Americans, men and, for the first time, women, ages 18 to 34. I ask the question, what are we setting ourselves up for? What exactly are we doing? The Washington Post ran an article, and it told us that the Army was going to issue combat badges for soldiers not in the infantry. The opening paragraph states: Any Army soldier who has seen active combat while in Iraq or Afghanistan may now receive a new Combat Action Badge, making tens of thousands of soldiers who are not in the infantry ranks, including women, eligible for a combat award for the first time. It recognizes that in the current realities of the battlefield and insurgency any soldier can be subject to a combat situation. However, the story also recognizes that more than halfway through fiscal year 2005 the Army is 15 percent behind in its effort to enlist new soldiers. What is this administration's position on women in combat? The Mideast Stars and Stripes ran a story entitled, Marine Raid Breaks Gender Barrier. ``Lance Corporal Erin Libby doesn't want to be treated the same as her male Marine Corps counterparts. But she does want to be treated as an equal, even in combat. ``In a way, she got her chance last weekend when Marines from the 3rd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment, led a raid into the city of Karmah in search of high-value targets and hidden weapons. `` `We're out here, and we're rocking on the front line,' said Libby, a 21-year old from Niceville, Florida. `` `This is history,' Chief Warrant Officer Jill St. John is quoted as saying. `I've been in the Marine Corps for 18 years, and this is my first opportunity to be out with an infantry company. Even 5 years ago, the Marine Corps wouldn't be doing this. This is a major change in how we think women can be used in the military.' '' Then there is the headline from the Guardian that says, The U.S. Lowers Standards in Army Numbers Crisis. Why do we need to do this? ``The U.S. military has stopped battalion commanders from dismissing new recruits for drug abuse, alcohol, poor fitness and pregnancy in an attempt to halt the rising attrition rate in an Army under growing strain.'' Last month, the Army announced that it was 6,000 soldiers short of its recruitment targets for the year so far, and tomorrow we are supposed to hear the latest numbers for recruitment. We are told in this article that recruiters have been given greater leeway. By doing things to increase quantity, you are also doing things to decrease quality, but they have made the judgment that that is the way to go. Now the Stars and Stripes ran a story that has to be disheartening to anyone who would read it. The headline: Advocates See Veterans of War on Terror Joining the Ranks of the Homeless. ``Advocates for the homeless already are seeing veterans from the war on terror living on the street and say the government must do more to ease their transition from military to civilian life. ``Veteran affairs officials estimate that about 250,000 veterans are homeless on any given night, and another 250,000 experience homelessness at some point.'' How can it be that if we have a million people sleeping on the streets of America at night that a quarter of them could be veterans? How do we choose to spend our money? It is certainly not to decrease the disparities that exist in this country, and it certainly is not to get rid of those who are homeless, and it certainly is not to take care of even the veterans, the veterans of our current war on terror. Too many of them are sleeping on the street. As for the war in Iraq, how did we get into this? My colleagues can come down and talk about the war. War is just a word for many of us who do not experience it, who do not feel it, who do not understand it. But there is an author by the name of James Bamford who has done a lot of writing about the U.S. intelligence establishment. He has written a new book, and he was interviewed by a Kevin Zeese about the new book. That book is entitled, A Pretext For War, and this is how Bamford explains how it came to be that we got involved in this war. This is what Bamford says. James Bamford says of his book, ``Pretext is the only book to take an in-depth look at the U.S. intelligence community from before 9/11 to the war in Iraq. It describes how CIA Director George Tenet, while succeeding in increasing the personnel strength of the CIA's clandestine service during the late 1990s, failed to change the culture, direction and training from a Cold War focus to a counterterrorism focus . . . Thus, the CIA never even tried to penetrate al Qaeda during the years leading up to 9/11, believing it too difficult, too dangerous or not their job, depending on which agency official I interviewed.'' This is James Bamford speaking. He continues to say, ``Pretext also takes the only minute-by-minute look, about one-third of the book, at the confusion and chaos taking place among senior officials in Washington and elsewhere in the hours following the 9/11 attack. It examines everything from the secret locations to which the Vice President and other officials disappeared, to the evacuation of the intelligence agencies, to the highly secret continuance of government procedures that were activated, many for the very first time. ``Next, Pretext describes how the claims involving Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, the connections between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda and Hussein's involvement with 9/11 were simply used as pretexts for a war long planned by a small group of neoconservatives supportive of the Israeli government's policies and the expansion of U.S. military power throughout the Middle East. It examines how top Bush administration officials, Richard Perle, Douglas Feith and David Wurmser first drafted a plan outlining an attack on Iraq and removal of Saddam Hussein in 1996. ``But the document titled `A Clean Break' was drafted for Israel not the United States.'' This is James Bamford speaking: ``At the time the three were acting as advisers to newly elected Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. `Israel can shape its strategic environment. This effort can focus on removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq, an important Israeli strategic objective.' Not satisfied with regime change in Iraq, they went on to recommend that Israel shape its strategic environment by rolling back Syria.'' Bamford continues: `` Wurmser then authored a paper in January 2001 arguing that the U.S. and Israel jointly launch a preemptive war throughout the Middle East and North Africa to establish U.S.-Israeli dominance. The U.S. and Israel should `strike fatally, not merely disarm, the centers of radicalism in the regions of Damascus, Baghdad, Tripoli, Tehran and Gaza.' He added that 'crisis were opportunities.' '' This is Wurmser being quoted by James Bamford. Bamford continues: ``About the same time on January 30, 2001, President Bush held his first National Security Council meeting, and according to former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill discussed only two topics, becoming closer to Israel's Ariel Sharon and locating targets to attack in Iraq.'' Bamford continues: ``As Wurmser had suggested following the 9/11 attacks, the Bush administration immediately began using the crisis as an opportunity to launch their long-planned war against Iraq. ``At 2:40 p.m. on September 11, as the Pentagon was still burning,'' and this is Bamford continuing, ``Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld dictated notes of his intention to blame Saddam Hussein even though there was no evidence of such link and all of the intelligence pointed exclusively to bin Laden and al Qaeda. `Hit S.H. at same time.' '' That is Rumsfeld. `` `Sweep him up whether related to 9/11 or not.' '' Bamford continues: ``Next Wurmser was put in charge of a secret unit in Feith's office with a cover name Policy Counterterrorism Evaluation Group. Its function was to gather and feed less than credible intelligence, intelligence discounted by the CIA such as the supposed Niger uranium deal to the White House and Vice President Cheney's office. Wurmser is now Cheney's top Middle East adviser.'' Bamford continues: ``Finally, Pretext closely examines the numerous lies and deceptions presented to the Congress, the American people, and the world in order to justify the war in Iraq.'' Bamford says: ``Finally, Pretext closely examines the numerous lies and deceptions presented to the Congress, the American public, and the world in order to justify the war in Iraq.'' One last note: he also tells us that there is another problem and that is of the CIA's new license to kill anytime and anywhere, overseas without oversight. He says they are now using missile-armed drones to do assassinations in Pakistan, Yemen, Afghanistan, and other places in total secrecy, often without notice even to the host countries; and these problems just scratch the surface in the intelligence community. James Bamford, author, investigative journalist, reporter, telling us the truth about how we came to be in Iraq. I would invoke another name, the name is Pat Tillman. Pat Tillman's family questions the reversal on the cause of the Ranger's death. The Washington Post tells us that former NFL player Pat Tillman's family is lashing out against the Army saying that the military's investigations into Tillman's friendly-fire death in Afghanistan last year were a sham, and the Army's efforts to cover up the truth have made it harder for them to deal with their loss more than a year after their son was shot several times by his fellow Army Rangers. Tillman's mother and father said in interviews they believe the government and the military created a heroic tale about how their son died to foster a patriotic response across the country. They say the Army's lies about what happened have made them suspicious and they are certain they will never get the full story. ``Pat had high ideals about the country, that is why he did what he did,'' Mary Tillman said in her first lengthy interview since her son's death. ``The military let him down. The administration let him down. It was a sign of disrespect. The fact that he was the ultimate team player and he watched his own men kill him is absolutely heartbreaking and tragic. The fact that they too lied about it afterwards is disgusting.'' Pat Tillman's father says, ``Maybe lying is not a big deal any more. Pat is dead, and this is not going to bring him back. But these guys should have been held up to scrutiny right up the chain of command, and no one has. ``If this is what happens when someone high profile dies, I can only imagine what happens with everyone else.'' These are quotes from the Washington Post from Pat Tillman's parents. And then there is the matter of the money, the money, the cost of this war. The cost of these priorities is at the expense of America's neighborhoods. Where is the money? The Washington Post again tells us that an audit of Iraq's spending spurs criminal probe. Now the Department of Defense has admitted that they cannot track $2.3 trillion, and we know that $100 million has been lost here and $9 million has been lost there, an estimate of $1 billion being lost every month. This Washington Post article says investigators have opened a criminal inquiry into millions of dollars missing in Iraq after auditors uncovered indications of fraud and nearly $100 million in reconstruction spending that could not be properly accounted for. But the leadership in this administration has told us that we can expect war for the next generation. And, indeed, it appears that preparations are being made for such a war, for such an endeavor. Military expansionism, directly against what Dwight Eisenhower warned us about. We have been told that Bush and Karzai signed a pact for long-term U.S. military presence in Afghanistan. They called it a strategic partnership. The Guardian tells us that the U.S. military is going to build four giant new bases in Iraq. These U.S. bases pave the way for long-term intervention in Central Asia. The U.S. Government, we are told, has acquired basing or transit rights for passage of war planes and military supplies from nearly two dozen countries in Central Asia, the Middle East and their periphery, a projection of American power into the center of the Eurasian land mass that has no historical precedent. All told, there are about 350,000 troops deployed worldwide. According to 2002 Pentagon documents, there were only 46 countries in the entire world that had no U.S. military presence. Only 46 countries in the entire world. Mr. Speaker, I would like to draw to your attention tonight as I begin to wind down, H.R. 2723, which was introduced recently by my esteemed colleague from New York to provide for the common defense by requiring that all young persons in the United States, including women, perform a period of military service or a period of civilian service in furtherance of the national defense and homeland security, and for other purposes. H.R. 2723 establishes civilian service, military service, a requirement. It sets out the length of time of that service, conditions for termination of that service, types of civilian service, implementation standards by the President, compensation and benefits for people age 18 to 26. It establishes deferments and postponements for high school students, those experiencing certain hardships and disability, establishes induction exceptions, for example, for people who do not have proper training. It establishes conscientious objection and alternative noncombatant or civilian service, discharge, and includes women. So I thought I would go to the Selective Service Web site and it tells us that Selective Service is also capable of providing inductees with special skills such as health care personnel after authorizing legislation is passed by Congress and a draft is ordered by the President. The agency would also administer an alternative service program for men classified as conscientious objectors who are required to perform such service in lieu of serving in the military. The question I asked is, how did we get here and where are we going? I would just like to conclude with the words, and I do not think I will have enough time to read the entire document, but all of this information that I have recounted today is available on the Internet. It is in the public domain. It is available in newspapers, domestic and international. It is just a matter of being able to put it all together and reading, reading and understanding. Smedley Darlington Butler, who was a major general in the United States Marine Corps, wrote a little tome entitled, War is a Racket. I would like to submit the entire document into the Record and I will read as much of it as I think I can. At least I will read the first opening paragraphs. ``War is a racket. It always has been. ``It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives. ``A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small `inside' group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes. ``In the World War,'' and he is talking about World War I because this was written a long time ago, ``a mere handful garnered the profits of the conflict. At least 21,000 new millionaires and billionaires were made in the United States during the First World War. That many admitted their huge blood gains in their income tax returns. How many other war millionaires falsified their tax returns no one knows. How many of these war millionaires shouldered a rifle? How many of them dug a trench? How many of them knew what it meant to go hungry in a rat- infested dugout? How many of them spent sleepless, frightened nights, ducking shells and shrapnel and machine gun bullets? How many of them parried a bayonet thrust of an enemy? How many of them were wounded or killed in battle? ``Out of war nations acquire additional territory, if they are victorious. They just take it. This newly acquired territory promptly is exploited by the few, the selfsame few who wrung dollars out of blood in the war. The general public shoulders the bill. ``And what is this bill? ``This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all its attendant miseries. Backbreaking taxation for generations and generations. ``For a great many years, as a soldier, I had a suspicion that war was a racket; not until I retired to civil life did I fully realize it. Now that I see the international war clouds gathering, as they are today, I must face it and speak out.'' These are the words of Smedley Darlington Butler in his book, War is a Racket. He goes on, in chapter two, to discuss who makes the profits. He goes through all of the war industries. He talks about the powder people, the steel companies, Anaconda, copper companies, a little increase in profits of approximately 200 percent. Does war pay? It paid them. But they aren't the only ones, he writes. There are still others. Leather, nickel, sugar. Chicago packers. The bankers. He goes through airplane and engine manufacturers. Shipbuilders. He says that the Senate committee probe of the munitions industry and its wartime profits, despite its sensational disclosures, hardly has scratched the surface. Even so, it had some effect. The State Department has been studying ``for some time'' methods of keeping out of war, and so the war department suddenly decides it has a wonderful plan to spring to limit the profits in wartime. Then he asks the question, but what about a limitation on losses? As far, he writes, as I have been able to ascertain, there is nothing in the scheme to limit a soldier to the loss of but one eye, or one arm, or to limit his wounds to one or two or three. Or to limit the loss of life. Of course, the committee cannot be bothered with such trifling matters. And then in chapter three, he asks, Who pays the bills? He says that the soldier pays the biggest part of the bill. In chapter four he says, How do we smash this racket? He says a few profit and the many pay. But there is a way to stop it. It can be smashed effectively only by taking the profit out of war. And then he goes on to describe how that could be done. He says, let the workers in the plants, let the CEOs of the corporations, let the Members of Congress who appropriate the money all get the same wages, all, even the generals and admirals. Let them get the same wages as the total monthly income of a soldier in the trenches. He says, when you can let the kings and the tycoons and the masters of business earn what the soldiers earn, then maybe we will not have war. Maybe we can take the profit out of war and maybe we can put an end to the racket. In chapter five, Smedley Butler tells us, I do not use these words, but he says, To hell with war. I wanted to use some of my time, and I do not have much left, to talk about, maybe to introduce what I will talk about next month, and that is the depravities of war and how we can become inhuman and inhumane. It does not take war, but it certainly seems to be exacerbated by war. I have a situation in my district where young black men already subdued, confined, in jail, tasered to death, how many black men, unarmed black men have been murdered on the streets of our country? The depravities of war. Who are we? What are we becoming? Why is this? I was told that I have to maintain decorum in this place. I think we as a people, we as a country, we as a Nation need to ask ourselves, what are we doing in Iraq? What are we doing around the world? What are we allowing the leadership of this country to do in our name? And when will we stop it?

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, I am against this rule and the underlying bill. Good substantive amendments that the American people need to hear debate on were not ruled in order. I have offered an amendment to force the Pentagon to share the names of the companies that have received $20 billion to make Pentagon computers talk to each other. According to the GAO, DOD business systems remain fundamentally flawed, unable to provide timely and reliable information and leaving DOD vulnerable to fraud, waste, and abuse. And yet we continue to give the Pentagon more and more, despite their admission that they cannot track $2.3 trillion and despite the fact that they lost $100 million in Iraqi building funds and $9 billion in Iraqi oil revenue. Both my amendments would force the Pentagon to tell us where all of this money is going. My second amendment would have required the Pentagon to tell the American people who had the contracts to operate the detention centers like Abu Ghraib that have so shamed us recently. Just imagine what we could do for Americans in need without all that Pentagon waste. I do, and that is why I ask these questions. Other amendments addressing critical issues were not allowed, and I can think of no reason why the majority refuses to allow a full debate on these critical issues confronting us today.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time. Mr. Chairman, where do I begin? I rise to oppose this bill for all that it represents about an America that has lost its way. The snows are melting on Mount Kilimanjaro. Polar ice caps are contracting. In Africa, wars stoked by the United States contribute to the deaths of millions. Millions more die from hunger and disease. More Americans than ever do not have health insurance. Joblessness in some areas is at an all-time high. And this Congress is cutting Medicaid. You might hear some talk up here about deficit spending, but there is precious little about the deficit so obvious as our values. Dr. King told us that we all live in a world house, that we have the resources and the know-how to provide everyone everywhere with the basic necessities of life and that we must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools. He reminded us that there is no deficit in human resources, but a deficit in human will. Nowhere is that more evident than in this half- trillion authorization for more fraud, waste, abuse and war. At some point, Mr. Chairman, we ought to have a serious talk in this body about peace. The American people have been blunted with the horrors of hate and just like we rejected the outrageous behavior of Southern demagogues during the Civil Rights era, the American people reject the outrageous behavior at our detention centers like Abu Ghraib. But such is the collateral damage of war. Today, courageous young men and women who joined the military to get a college education and not to go to war are taking a stand in their own way to reject war and hate. I urge my colleagues to find a new way and to do it today.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, it has been a long time since I have taken the well of the House of Representatives. Today, the people of Georgia's 4th Congressional District are happy that I am back. I have received notes, calls, letters and visits from people all over America who are glad to see me back in Congress. They are glad to have a voice. That voice. The voice. The voice back. The voice who spoke out and asked the questions about waste and abuse at the Pentagon. The fact that our Secretary of Defense would come to the House Committee on Armed Services, on which I served, and admit the loss of $2.3 trillion and say in the same breath that our country can afford it; and the massive amounts of money that we send to the Pentagon today without even questioning how it has been spent; that we can afford it; or that we are getting the appropriate bang for our taxpayer bucks. I questioned the no-bid sweetheart deals with favored insider corporations, like the Carlisle Group and Halliburton. I did not understand how our sitting Vice President could still be drawing a paycheck from the Halliburton Company and, at the same time, serve the interests of the American people. I asked why weapon systems, unwanted by the Pentagon, still found their way into the President's defense request. I wondered why our soldiers were being required to take anthrax and smallpox vaccines that had not even been cleared by the FDA. I was amazed to learn that the administrator of the vaccines program was DynePort, a subsidiary of a company whose employees had been found guilty of trafficking in young women, raping young girls, and holding women of all ages as sex slaves. I asked questions about how the United States could entirely change its military doctrine to one of preemption and there not be a discussion about the ramifications of that with the American people. All that happened was that the Secretary of Defense came before the Committee on Armed Services and said that the new U.S. posture was going to be to seize foreign capitals and occupy them. Of course, this was long before anyone in the public was aware that we would soon be sending our young men and women off to a war to do just that. I was appalled at the acceptance without question of what was clearly a deviation from then current policy, but what was seemingly also more than just a theoretical forward projection of our military might. What Rumsfeld enunciated back then was exactly what we are doing now. I publicly questioned how such a fundamental shift could be sanctioned without the least bit of controversy. I questioned why private militaries, some would say mercenary outfits while others would say U.S. intelligence front companies, like DynCorp were being given contracts that seems to me to allow escape of congressional oversight. DynCorp was spraying chemicals on plants and people in Colombia and had a presence in Peru, Qatar, Haiti, Afghanistan and now Iraq. I wondered what would happen when Americans employed by these companies are hurt or killed or are caught carrying out a mission not approved by the Congress or was unknown by the Congress. I guess you could say I just had too many questions. And, sadly, I did not like the answers I was finding as I did my research. Over 3 years ago, I asked questions about the appearance of war profiteering just after our President declared the war on terror, and I called for an investigation into the tragic events of September 11. Now, I am pleased that important legislation to look into war profiteering has been introduced and voted on in this House. And today, we voted on legislation suggested by the 9/11 Commission which was convened to investigate the tragic events of September 11 just as I had called for. Everyone in this body and most who are watching know what happened to me for asking these questions and demanding accountability. I was kicked out of Congress, and for 2 years, I had the opportunity to travel around our country and to other countries and tell my story to people who were hungry to know more about America's war on terror and about September 11. During those 2 years, I met some wonderful patriots who want only the best for our country and its people and who wish for peace with justice for other people around the world. And that is why we have been inundated with letters and calls and e-mails and faxes and visits from people all over the country welcoming me back to Congress. And so I am glad to be here and rejoin my colleagues in the competition of ideas on how we can make our country even better. This afternoon I would like to start by recounting an experience that happened to me this morning. This morning, I was doing my customary walk to work to enjoy these wonderful Washington, D.C., mornings. And about midway through my walk, I heard a little boy yelling at me. He was asking me to stop the bus for him as he was running to catch the bus for school. Usually I am loaded down with lots of bags, but this morning, thank goodness, I did not have a heavy load. And so I kicked into high gear, and I ran so I could catch that bus for that little boy. I caught the tail end of the bus, and I banged on the back of the bus to get it to stop and let the little boy on, but the bus pulled off without acknowledging any of my bangs. I turned to the little boy, and I told him, ``Don't give up. Let's run, we'll catch that bus together.'' So we both got into high gear, and we ran and we ran and we ran and we ran. And soon I saw that the bus had stopped. So I told the little boy, ``Don't give up, we can make it. We've just got to keep on running.'' The little boy did not give up. He kept running. The little boy's determination to make it to that bus was evident. The little boy wanted to get to school. While the bus was stopped at the red light, we managed to catch up. The fact that we did not give up gave us the opportunity to catch the bus. I thought there was a good lesson in that for the little boy. And then I started to bang on the bus. I banged on the bus from the rear all the way up to the front passenger door. I pointed to the little boy who was just a few steps behind me, and I yelled, ``Please open the door. Let this little boy onto the bus.'' The driver looked at me. She looked at the little boy. She shook her head, and she drove off. The little boy was crushed. Tears welled in his eyes. He wanted to get to school. That bus represented the door of opportunity. He had done all he could to reach that door. He ran. He told himself he could make it. He made it. That, in and of itself, was a victory, but it still was not enough to get the little boy on the bus and on his way to school. The door of opportunity for that little boy was closed when the bus pulled off. It left that little boy behind. And so what I would like to address today are the closed doors of opportunity that leave too many Americans behind. That little boy's name was Martin. That is important, because behind the statistics that we tout on this floor every day over and over again are real people whose lives are affected by what we do and the decisions we make. Mr. Speaker, the policies of this Congress and this administration and the decisions of the court are leaving too many Americans behind. Our goal ought to be to open the doors of opportunity for all Americans, so that no one is left behind. But, sadly, the statistics tell us conclusively that the doors of opportunity are as closed for certain Americans as they were for little Martin this morning. Today, I would like to explore some of those statistics and suggest that we fail to do our jobs if we do not enact policies that turn these numbers around. I will be quoting from Hull House, the New York Times, United for a Fair Economy, and the National Urban League. Hull House is an organization in Chicago. They did a study on the disparities between blacks and whites living in Chicago, and what they found was that in economic and social indices, it would take 200 years for those gaps in the quality of life enjoyed by black Chicagoans and white Chicagoans to close. Here is what they said: Fourteen years ago, a report was released examining human relations in Chicago that told us that racism was alive and well. Over the years, we have seen racial disparity impacted by a growing economic gap that has left many behind. The information in this report will help us create more effective, sustainable solutions by allowing us to deal with systemic barriers. It is critical that we establish a floor under which no Chicagoan will fall. Where are these gaps in Chicago? They are in income, wealth and employment, education, health, housing, welfare and health of children, crime, law enforcement and justice and transportation. The gap between high- and low-income households in the region increased 11 percent between 1999 and 2000, the first rise in 7 years. Under health, in Illinois, Latinos had the highest rate of non- elderly uninsured, 29 percent; followed by blacks at 24 percent; Asian, Pacific Islander/Native Americans at 17 percent. For the white population, the rate is 10 percent. For crime, law enforcement and justice, African-Americans are less likely to use drugs than whites or Latinos. Let me repeat that: African-Americans are less likely to use drugs than whites or Latinos. There is, however, a gap between the number of African-Americans who are convicted of drug possession or drug delivery and sentenced to prison and the number of whites and Latinos who are convicted of the same crime who get probation. Another study was conducted by the New York Times. In that survey, they found that nearly 50 percent of all African-American men living in New York City were unemployed. Nearly 50 percent of African-American men between the ages of 16 and 64 were unemployed, a crisis, an emergency. African-American unemployment remains high. It is significantly higher than the national average. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office recently reported African-Americans have lost up to 88 percent of their earning potential since President Bush assumed office in January 2001. I think I need to repeat that one: The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office recently reported African- Americans have lost up to 88 percent of their earning potential since President Bush assumed office in January 2001. Another study: Blacks lose better jobs faster as middle-class work drops. Unemployment among blacks is rising at a faster pace than at any time since the mid-1970s, and jobs lost are mostly in manufacturing where pay for blacks has historically been higher than in any other fields. Nearly 2.6 million jobs have disappeared in the past 28 months, nearly 90 percent in manufacturing. Jobless blacks are continuing to look for work, but the types of jobs lost have diminished their standing in the middle class. I have a report which is the status of health in DeKalb County, which is in my district of the Fourth Congressional District. Now, folks in the Fourth Congressional District like to tout that our district of African-American communities is the first or second most affluent African-American community in the entire United States. Yet that affluent African-American community, first or second in the United States, has a result thus in infant mortality: In 2001, Georgia had the ninth highest infant mortality rate in the United States with a rate of 8.6 deaths per 1,000 live births. Infant mortality rates in DeKalb County have been increasing slightly from 9.9 deaths per 1,000 live births in 1994 to 10.5 in 2002. From 1994 to 2002, there was an average of 12 black infant deaths per 1,000 live births and 4.7 white infant deaths per 1,000 live births. That is the statistic for the first or second most affluent African-American community in the country. Let us look at some information that has been provided to us by United for a Fair Economy. United for a Fair Economy produces a report every year called the ``State of the Dream Report.'' In their 2004 ``State of the Dream Report,'' they discuss racial disparities in poverty. The black poverty rate was three times greater than the white poverty rate in 2002. At the slow rate that the black/white poverty gap has been narrowing since 1968, it will take 150 years to close the gap. Let us look at imprisonment. They start out with a quote from Dr. King. He says: ``So I must return to the valley, a valley filled with millions of people who, because of economic deprivation and social isolation, have lost hope and seen life as a long and desolate corridor with no exit sign. I must return to the valley all over the South and in the big cities of the North, a valley filled with millions of our white and Negro brothers who are smoldering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society.'' African Americans on imprisonment are about six times as likely as whites to have been imprisoned at some point in their lives. This gap between black and white men is growing. One out of three black males born in 2001 will be imprisoned at some point in their lifetime if current trends continue. That is up from one out of 11 in 1974. By comparison, 5.9 percent of white males born in 2001, 5.6 percent of black females, and nine-tenths of 1 percent of white females have a lifetime chance of imprisonment. What about child poverty? Almost a third of black children live in poverty, 32.1 percent in 2002. The child poverty gap would take 210 years to disappear, not reaching parity until 2212. Income, for every dollar of white income, African Americans had 55 cents in 1968. That is the year Dr. King was murdered. In 2001 African Americans had 57 cents for every dollar of white income. It has taken more than 3 decades for blacks to close the gap by two cents. At this pace it would take 581 years for blacks to gain the other 43 cents, which would bring them to parity with white per-capita income. And let us look at housing. The homeownership gap has barely budged since 1970. In 2002 almost three quarters of white Americans owned their own home, compared with fewer than half of African Americans. If the homeownership gap continues to close at this rate, it would take 1,664 years, or approximately 55 generations, before the gap is completely closed. I know that I am not willing to wait 581 years. I am not willing to wait 1,664 years, and I think the American people ought not be willing to tolerate these kinds of inequalities. The National Urban League produces an annual report called the ``State of Black America,'' and they have just recently produced the 2005 edition of the ``State of Black America.'' Their headline: ``Even as U.S. Economy Gets Better, Jobs and Wealth Gap Gets Larger on the `Equality Index.' '' They say to us: ``Equality between blacks and whites in urban America is not improving, and changes in national policies and priorities must be made to help, according to a report released by the National Urban League, entitled `The State of Black America, 2005, Prescriptions for Change.' '' The overall equality index shows that black status remains at 73 percent, but the numbers inside the index tell a troubling story in terms of unemployment, income, and wealth. Marc Morial, the President and CEO of the National Urban League, says: ``Our Nation must wake up. The growing wealth gap in this country is not just leaving behind Black America. It's leaving behind the middle class, urban America, rural America, and Hispanic America too. When one community in America suffers, our entire economy suffers. That is why we are recommending specific changes in our national priorities and policies.'' In economics the National Urban League finds that this is still the largest divide. Black economic status measures 57 percent of white counterparts, an equality gap 20 percent wider than any other category. Black unemployment remains stagnant at 10.8 percent while white unemployment dropped to 4.7 percent, making black unemployment more than twice that of whites. Under health, black health status is 76 percent of whites. Under education black education status is 77 percent of whites. Under social justice, when measuring sentence enforcement and victimization, black versus white equality under law is 68 percent of whites, 5 percent less than 2004, the worst decline overall. We went backwards on the measure for social justice. Blacks are three times more likely to become prisoners once arrested and a black person's average jail sentence is 6 months longer than a white's for the same crime. What can be done? The National Urban League offers us some specific recommendations, some of which I will read here. First on their list of recommendations is the extension of the Voting Rights Act, which expires in 2007. Now, a whole lot of American people do not know, even our President did not know, that the important enforcement provisions of the Voting Rights Act expire in 2007. How can it be, how can it be, that the Voting Rights Act enforcement provisions would ever expire after the pain and the suffering that brought the Voting Rights Act to signature in 1965, after the American people had the opportunity to see Bloody Sunday when African Americans in Alabama were trying to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge just so that they could get the right to vote? How could any provision of the Voting Rights Act ever expire? The National Urban League also recommends that we raise the minimum wage, and they suggest that we close the homeownership gap; 1,664 years is intolerable. And as the President touts homeownership and how homeownership is an integral part of his ownership society that he wants to create, 1,664 years to close that gap is intolerable. Expanding job training, strengthening the Community Development Block Grant program, and to double the size of the New Markets Tax Credit program, these are just some of the recommendations that are put forward by the National Urban League. In the United Kingdom, it is interesting to note that a psychiatrist was able to publish in the ``British Medical Journal'' that racism is harmful to one's health, is harmful to one's mental health; racism is harmful to health. He notes that a group of Harvard University researchers documented that a mere 1 percent increase in incidences of racial disrespect, the kind of stuff like following black people in a store, for which there have been many lawsuits in stores; or having African Americans go to restaurants and not being served, for which there have been many lawsuits; or for discrimination at the workplace in big corporations that get tax breaks here, for which many lawsuits have been filed, the result of a mere 1 percent increase of racial disrespect translates to an increase in 350 deaths per 100,000 African Americans. So not only is racism harmful to one's mental health; it is harmful to the fabric of our country. It is harmful to the very lives of the people who are impacted by it. This is now the budget season in the United States Congress. We are deliberating on the budget, which are the priorities of our country; and pretty soon we will be receiving reports from the Committee on Appropriations on how those priorities are going to be translated into real dollars for the American people. One could say that the budget is the most important piece of legislation passed by any legislative body and certainly is very important because it sets the policies and priorities for our country. The very definition of politics is who gets what. The authoritative allocation of values in a society, the definition of politics: that is the budget process, the appropriations process. Who gets what, whose problems get solved. We have the opportunity in this Congress to solve these problems. We have a responsibility in this Congress to solve these problems, to make this country better for all of our people so that the bus of opportunity does not pull off when we are standing there trying to get on, so that the doors of opportunity are open for all Americans. And I am proud to say that under the leadership of the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Watt) that the members of the Congressional Black Caucus have decided to tackle these disparities, these intolerable disparities. One of the things, however, that we have a responsibility to do is to make sure that the American people understand that these inequalities, these inequities, these gaps, these disparities, that they exist. I would like to add a few comments before I begin to wrap up. These comments are about the United for a Fair Economy 2005 report that takes into consideration the President's proposals in the budget. United for a Fair Economy says that while, at first, President Bush's ownership society goals may appear to be consistent with Dr. Martin Luther King's dream of economic opportunity for all races, during the first Bush administration, the United States actually moved farther away from Dr. King's vision. The employment and income picture has gotten worse for people of color since 2000, eroding the progress that was made during the 1990s. We all know that not only did the Clinton years provide prosperity for all Americans, all boats were lifted up, but those boats within the African-American community and other communities of color were lifted up. In 2000, the African-American unemployment rate reached an historic low: an historic low. Latino and Hispanic unemployment rates also dropped, but have risen again in the last 4 years. About half of the progress in the median income of people of color from 1996 to 2000 was wiped out in the first 3 years of the Bush administration. After slowly increasing from 55 percent of white income to 65 percent in 2000, black median income fell to 62 percent. For the first time in 15 years, the average Latino household now has an income that is less than two-thirds that of the average white household. So not only are blacks falling back, Latinos are falling back as well. Throughout the 1990s, poverty rates fell across-the-board. All boats were being lifted up in the 1990s. But since 2000, more than one-third of that progress in reducing poverty among African-American families has been erased; 300,000 African-American families fell below the poverty line from 2000 to 2003. What about private retirement income and inheritances? Well, they remain scarce among people of color. We have heard a lot of talk about Social Security and privatizing Social Security, and the gentleman from Washington (Mr. McDermott) was here earlier, and he talked about insecurity, social insecurity. African-Americans have less in private pensions and retirement accounts, if you are unemployed you have got to have less, and so depend more heavily on Social Security. They would be more affected than whites by any privatization plan that made benefits uncertain. And, of course, we talked about home ownership; United for a Fair Economy revisits the issue of home ownership in their 2005 report. Then they add that business owners of color, who are largely small business owners, received only minor tax breaks from the four Bush tax cuts. Most tax breaks for businesses and investors have landed with those who are wealthy and white. Now, we understand what the President told us in the movie Fahrenheit 911. He told us that his base were the haves and the have-mores. So, accordingly, the tax cuts have provided money for the haves and the have-mores, and that is borne out in these statistics. Now, what do we do about this? We have to address these issues in public policy. It is public policy that can turn these numbers around and make better the lives of all of the little Martins out there who did their best and still found that the door of opportunity was closed for them, to turn that around and make opportunity available for all of them. Public policy requires, though, a consensus. It requires an American consensus. So we fought the Civil War, and after the Civil War, the Congress passed a Civil Rights Act. So 1964 was not the first time that we had a Civil Rights Act passed, because there was a consensus that something needed to be done to help all Americans. But how can we arrive at a consensus when the American people are not informed of the facts? Well, you certainly cannot get it on the WB or UPN. You cannot even get it on BET or CNN a lot of the time. But we are told by a Harvard University-Kaiser Family Foundation study that misperceptions cloud whites' views of blacks. You cannot arrive at an answer if you do not know the facts. Misperceptions cloud whites' views of blacks: Whether out of hostility, indifference or simple lack of knowledge, large numbers of white Americans incorrectly believe that blacks are as well off as whites in terms of their jobs, incomes, schooling and health care, according to a national survey by the Washington Post, the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation and Harvard University. Depending on the question, the poll found that 40 percent to 60 percent of all whites say that the average black American is faring about as well and perhaps even better than the average white in these areas. These misperceptions have consequences, the survey suggests. Among whites, the pervasiveness of incorrect views seems to explain at least in part white resistance to even the least intrusive types of affirmative action, and more broadly, these mistaken beliefs represent formidable obstacles to any government efforts to equalize the social and economic standing of the races. This is the State of the Dream 2005 report, issued by United for a Fair Economy, and in its introduction, it quotes President Bush: ``The generation of wealth should not be limited to a few in our society. It ought to be an opportunity for everybody. There is nothing better than providing the incentive to say this is my asset base, I own it, I will live on it in retirement, and I will pass it on to somebody in my own family.'' Dr. Martin Luther King had a response for that, even though dead. Dr. King said, ``The majority of white Americans consider themselves sincerely committed to justice for the Negro. They believe that American society is essentially hospitable to fair play and to steady growth toward a middle-class utopia embodying racial harmony. But unfortunately, this is a fantasy of self-deception and comfortable vanity.'' I would hope that all of the reams of paper that have been produced recording these studies that I have recounted here this afternoon, from Hull House reporting on Chicago to the New York Times reporting on African-American male unemployment at 50 percent between the ages of 16 and 64, which is veritably the entire population, to United for a Fair Economy to the National Urban League to Harvard University to the Kaiser Family Foundation, the reams and reams and reams and reams of paper produced chronicaling the pitiful state that some Americans continue to have to endure. Mr. Speaker, it is clear that we are leaving too many Americans behind. Our policies are creating two Americas, and, instead of growing together, we are clearly growing apart. I hope to return to this place, to this well, and do more special orders about this subject and other subjects of interest to my constituents in my district and the people who have voiced their support around the country. We have such serious issues, and the people need our help and our attention. Mr. Speaker, I am hopeful that this Congress will provide some relief to all of the people who fall into the numbers that I have accounted tonight.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, I speak with you today about one of America's heroes, Sgt. Kevin Benderman. Sgt. Benderman is not a hero because he served a tour of duty in the Occupation of Iraq, though he did. He is not a hero because of the medals he was awarded, nor his ten years of honorable service in the U.S. Army. No, Sgt. Kevin Benderman is a hero because when all around him are pressing forward to prosecute a violent war against the people of Iraq, Kevin Benderman had the courage to stand up and assert his heartfelt opposition to war. Sgt. Benderman's opposition is not the theoretical if sincere opposition of a student peace activist. Kevin Benderman has seen things that none of God's children should have to endure. He was present when his superior ordered his unit to open fire on small children who were throwing rocks at the soldiers of his unit. He chased the hungry dogs from an open mass grave filled with the bodies of young children, old men and women. Kevin saw the burned child, crying in pain, while all around her ignored her injuries. As he reflected on what he had experienced, he chose to not re- enlist, to not participate in a war and an institution that he could no longer square with his evolving yet sincerely held beliefs. But stretched by an immoral war, based on lies, beyond the limits of the resources afforded them, our military adopted a ``stop loss order'' policy to arbitrarily breech the contracts our nation made with those who serve in its military services. So Kevin did what was necessary. He applied for Conscientious Objector status. His officers up the chain of command refused their duty to accept his application. His commander called him a coward. His unit chaplain refused to meet with him, writing by email that he was ``ashamed'' of Kevin. He was charged with ``Desertion with Intent to Avoid Hazardous Duty'' and ``Missing Movement by Design''. His preliminary hearings methodically violated every precept of substantive due process. He now faces a Court Martial on May 11 and the possibility of seven years in the stockade. Every member of our Armed Forces raises their hands, as do we, and take an oath, as do we, to ``defend the Constitution of the United States''. That Constitution protects the ``Right of Conscience'', including the right to conscientiously object to war as an instrument of public policy. But given the climate we face right now, asserting such a right takes real courage. And it is the exercise of that courage which makes Sgt. Benderman a hero in my book. It is a crime and a shame that while we are so busy working to expand freedom to other nations, we can't slow down to protect our precious freedoms among ourselves. [From the Savannah Morning News, March 28, 2005] Defense Lawyer, Investigator Square Off Over Benderman's Conscientious Objector Application (By John Carrington) Filings and e-mails show that a `non-adversarial' hearing over Sgt. Kevin Benderman's conscientious objector status was anything but cordial. Sgt. Kevin Benderman poses with his wife Monica following Article 32 proceedings, a military court process similar to a preliminary hearing. Benderman, who has applied for conscientious objector status, has been charged with desertion for not deploying to Iraq with his unit. The defense lawyer and the investigating officer for Sgt. Kevin Benderman's conscientious objector application apparently attended different hearings last month. Both sides maintain they kept their cool during the hearing, saying the other side lost theirs, according to written recommendations and rebuttals released to the Savannah Morning News. One thing is clear: a hearing that was, according to Army regulations, supposed to be a ``non-adversarial'' proceeding was anything but that. Capt. Victor Aqueche, the Fort Stewart-appointed investigating officer, wrote in a recommendation memo following the hearing that Benderman was ``argumentative'' at times, and his demeanor ``untactful'' at others. In his rebuttal, Maj. S. Scot Sikes, Benderman's military lawyer, said Aqueche at times became ``agitated, snide and hostile'' toward Benderman. Sikes argued that Aqueche's ``incestuous appointment'' as investigating officer set the tone for this type of ill- willed ping-pong. ``(Aqueche) is assigned to the same battalion command,'' and consequently ``was placed in the position of making a critical determination regarding a soldier assigned to one of his colleague captain's own units,'' Sikes wrote. In an interview Monday, Sikes said, ``That bothered me. You know they're buds.'' Aqueche did not respond to requests for comment. Sikes also said Monday he knew the command looked at the timing of Benderman's request--just before he was scheduled to deploy--with suspicion. ``But it should have not been so hostilely received.'' That goes against the ``non-adversarial'' tone and tenor the application review is supposed to have, he said. Sikes asked for a new hearing, a request he says was denied. He now has until Friday to file another rebuttal to Aqueche's response to the defense's initial rebuttal. In early February, Sikes and Aqueche squared off almost immediately over the hearing's timing. It was scheduled the day after an Article 32 hearing to determine whether Benderman would face a general court-martial on charges he deserted and missed the January movement of his troops as they deployed to Iraq. Sikes wanted a delay of a ``mere'' week. ``Sgt. Benderman is very concerned that he cannot be adequately prepared for a hearing,'' Sikes wrote in a Feb. 3 e-mail attached to the rebuttal. ``Preparations for the Article 32 cannot be overstated; it's very important.'' Aqueche shot down the request with the following e-mail: ``Sgt. Benderman made a conscious decision to take 14 days of leave prior to his Article 32 . . . A delay as such could be considered `insincerity' on the part of Sgt. Benderman.'' The investigation officer also said, ``There is no preparation needed on Sgt. Benderman's behalf in order to answer questions regarding this application.'' Yet Aqueche, in his March 23 recommendation memo, wrote, ``I firmly believe Sgt. Benderman was not prepared for the in-depth questions presented during the CO hearing.'' Aqueche's memo also said that, during the hearing, Benderman would consult with Sikes and then either refuse to answer questions--and question their relevancy to the application--or offer ``vague'' or delayed answers. Sikes pointed out that, as Benderman's lawyer for both the court-martial charges and the conscientious objector application, he had to keep the sergeant from saying anything that could create more legal problems in the criminal case. ``And Aqueche made that out to be a negative thing,'' Sikes said Monday. ``Anything Benderman says can be used against him in the court-martial. That puts me in a precarious position. There are some things I just could not let him answer.'' The court-martial is scheduled for May 12. Sikes likes Benderman's chances on the desertion charges. ``It seems kind of silly to say he deserted over a weekend,'' the lawyer said Monday. ``He was right there at his house, only 2 to 3 miles from the post.'' Despite Aqueche's characterization of Benderman's demeanor during the hearing--and the captain's recommendation to deny the sergeant's application--Sikes also thinks Benderman will have better luck higher up the chain of command.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman and I will not tell my colleagues which birthday it is. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the CBC budget and against the priorities of the Republican budget. The Republican budget does nothing to decrease the racial disparities that exist in our country. In fact, it exacerbates them. Seventy-six years to close the college graduation gap, 581 years to close the wealth gap, 1,664 years to close the homeownership gap. But when Republicans talk about growth, it is clear that too many American communities are just not included. It is also clear that the Republicans do not see our constituents because if they did, they would not legislate public policy that hurts them. Even Alan Greenspan has decried the unsustainable income imbalances in our country. The Republicans continue to ignore him, us, and our constituents. It is a sad day when veterans, children, seniors, small business owners, rural Americans, and poor Americans have to take a back seat to the scions of industry and Wall Street. I support the CBC budget and reject the priorities of the Republican budget. I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Chairman, I want to talk about who wins and who loses in the Bush Republican budget. Three hundred thousand working poor who have children will be cut from the Food Stamp Program. I received a call today from a constituent from Lithonia, Georgia, complaining that her children depend on the food stamps she gets to stretch the family food budget. LIHEAP is the Low Income Heating Assistance Program that makes sure our working families do not freeze during the winter, and the Republicans propose to cut that program even as heating costs rise. While the Republicans want us to believe that they really care about our children, the proof is in where they choose to put taxpayers' money. The Pentagon cannot account for $2.3 trillion. Halliburton walks away with over $100 million undeserved dollars. Secretary Rumsfeld says the U.S. can afford record defense expenditures, while the President proposes to cut all vocational education at the high school level, the Safe and Drug Free Schools program, the Upward Bound program and even dropout prevention. What could be more important to the Education President than to make sure that our young people graduate from high school with an education that has prepared them for life. Well, I know the answer to that question. Not the mom and pop businesses on Main Street and their families, but the wealthy scions of industry on Wall Street. Even chairman of the Federal Reserve System, Alan Greenspan, lamented before our committee the growing wealth and education disparities in our country. The Republicans will talk about growth, but they will not talk about how our country is growing apart. They tell us that homeownership is on the rise, but they will not tell us that three-quarters of white families in this country own their homes while the majority of Asian Americans, Native Americans, Latinos and African Americans remain renters. According to just about every reputable study, the disparity between black quality of life and white quality of life is not narrowing nearly as fast as we would like it to. In the last 6 years, wealth for white families grew by 37 percent while wealth for families of color fell by 7 percent. These numbers represent real people who have not felt one bit of Republican growth. Mr. Chairman, too many Americans, especially African Americans and Latinos, cannot afford health care, housing and even a college education. We have two choices: we can grow together, or we can grow apart. When we invested it in our people like Social Security, the GI bill, civil rights laws, affirmative action, America grew and we all grew together. But now because of the policies coming out of Washington, D.C., today's wealthiest 10 percent own 70 percent of America's wealth. It is clear that Americans are growing apart. The Republican budget ought to provide opportunity for all to experience America's coming prosperity, but it is also clear it does not.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, as the bells of freedom toll around the globe, it seems appropriate to honor one of America's noble freedom fighters. And so today, in recognition of the memory and continuing legacy of a true founder of American freedom, I am introducing a resolution to designate March 10, 1990, as ``Harriet Tubman Day.'' Harriet Tubman was born on the eastern shore of Maryland around 1820 and escaped from slavery in 1849. Her freedom, however, was not the beginning of her fight. Even as a child slave, she battled against slavery and injustice. One day, she was ordered by an overseer to help him tie up another slave who was to be beaten. She defied that order and allowed the fellow slave to escape. Bun in the process, Harriet Tubman paid a high price for her defiance and her convictions. She was inflicted with a wound so severe that it would cause health problems for the rest of her life. The beating was not the first, nor would it be the last. But despite that cruel scar and despite the deep scars of slavery, Harriet Tubman still pursued. With a vigor difficult to image, she pursued her seemingly distant dreams and the buried promise of freedom. Her own freedom was not good enough, though--others were still enslaved. A year after her own escape, Harriet Tubman became a conductor on the underground railroad. She was so successful--she alone led about 300 slaves to freedom--that a bounty, with a horrifying sentence of torture until death, was offered for her capture. Yet, she continued to travel the route of the underground railroad, telling fellow conductor Thomas Garrett that she ``ventured only where God sent: and bragging years later that she had ``never run off track or lost a passenger.'' Time and time again whenever Harriet Tubman encountered unbeatable odds or insurmountable obstacles, she beat them and surmounted them, forging a path of service, spirit, and strength for all of us to follow. Through her service--as a conductor on the underground railroad, as a soldier and a tender of soldiers, and as a speaker for those who could not speak for themselves--Harriet Tubman gave hope to countless slaves who referred to her as their ``Moses'' and who, because of her, realized that they would one day be led from oppression to the promised land of freedom. Through her strength--a strength that compelled her to risk her own freedom so that others could experience it--Harriet Tubman provided an inspiration of liberty, justice and opportunity that serves us still. The service, spirit and strength of Harriet Tubman represents in timeless eloquence much of what is best in us, as Americans and as human beings. Mr. President, slavery was the darkest chapter in American history. But, out of the darkness of persecution in South Africa came the light of Nelson Mandela. And, out of the darkness of slavery in America came the light of Harriet Tubman. Today, that light is kept alive by the Harriet Tubman Historical Society, located in my hometown of Wilmington, DE. Harriet Tubman Day is the brainchild of its executive director, Vivian Abdur-Rahim. The widespread support this commemorative has receive around the country-- 19 states and several citizens have already endorsed it--is a result of Vivian's tireless tenacity. She has made a tremendous investment toward establishing this day of recognition and tribute, and I am proud to ask the Senate to add its support to such a worthy and important effort.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, to continue the discussion about the budget, let me just say that the purpose of a budget, the budget is the most important legislative document that the Congress will produce; and in fact, all legislative bodies produce a budget, be it the school board, city council, county commission, the legislature, and of course us here in Washington, D.C., in the Congress. And the budget is our statement of values. It is a statement of values, because we look at the definition of politics, and it is the authoritative allocation of values in a society; and how are those values authoritatively allocated? They are reflected in the decisions that we make with respect to how we are going to spend our money. And so when the President sends his budget to the Congress, the budget of the President then reflects the values of the President. And so this President has talked about an American prosperity, an America of prosperity and opportunity. But the America that the President seems to value is a very narrow America indeed. In other words, our mantra ought to be leave no American behind in our quest for opportunity and prosperity for all. But, sadly, many Americans have indeed been left behind. And the situation is not getting better, it is getting worse. A very few Americans are doing extremely well. But many of us are being left behind, and, in fact, too many of us are being left behind. For the latest statistics available, it takes 100 million Americans at the bottom to equal the share of national income received by the top 2.7 million Americans. And this budget does not even begin to address the widening income gulf in our country. In fact, it exacerbates it. The employment and income picture has gotten worse for people of color, in particular, since 2000, eroding the tremendous progress that was made during the decade of the 1990s. And in fact, since 2000 more than one-third of the progress made in reducing poverty among African American families has been completely, totally, absolutely 100 percent erased, as 300,000 African American families fell below the poverty line just from the year 2000 to the year 2003. I would like to bring your attention to the product of an organization, a product that I have become dependent on as I try and travel around the country and educate folks about the true conditions faced by people in this country. It is the State of the Dream from United for a Fair Economy. And every year they produce a report, ``The State of the Dream 2004,'' ``The State of the Dream 2005,'' about the inequalities, the disparities that exist in our country along the racial divide. Now, I have got a couple of charts here that I would just like to show. Now, on the index of income, can you imagine that from 1968 to 2001, the average black income was 55 cents compared to that for white income, and 57 cents in 2001? What United For a Fair Economy has found is that since the murder of Dr. Martin Luther King, Junior, on some of those most important indices, the situation has gotten worse, not better, for people in our country. And here over the span of 33 years, we have only increased the well- being by 2 cents. And at the current rate, it would take 581 years to even out the black-white gap in income. Or we can look at poverty. Overall poverty to close the gap, 150 years to close the gap, the poverty gap as experienced by black Americans and white Americans. Or we can look at child poverty. The President says he wants to leave no child behind, but sadly, if we look at the numbers, and these numbers represent real children, it will take us 210 years to close the child poverty gap. The President talked about housing, and we all know that homeownership is the cornerstone for the beginning of the accumulation of wealth, and look here at homeownership. It will take us 1,664 years to close the homeownership gap. Is that not incredible? What does that tell us about our country's values and priorities? Our President talks about making this an opportunity, making this a prosperity society for all Americans, but if the President's budget does not deal with these very real differences in the way real Americans live, then the President has talked to us but he has not really backed his words with a policy statement that will change the way the bulk of Americans live in this country. The President cannot create an ownership society without addressing these disparities, and sadly, his budget proposal falls short of even his stated goals. I look forward to actually being able to call the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt) Mr. Chairman and have folks on the other side of the aisle call him Mr. Chairman, too.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, I had the honor of knowing Ossie Davis. I met him during my 2-year hiatus from Congress, and after learning of my story, he joined the thousands of Americans who, too, were outraged at my treatment by the dominant political personalities of the day and the media. He and his wife were committed to my return to Congress and acted on that commitment. The Dee-Davis family mourns but all of America mourns, too. Ossie Davis is of particular note because he utilized the platform of an arts icon as a part of his struggle against injustice in this country. Ossie Davis could have led a comfortable life. Ossie Davis could have led a quiet life, but Ossie Davis chose to stand and stand again when doing so invited discomfort and controversy. I was honored to have had the opportunity to meet him personally. My condolences go out to his family and admirers, and I am pleased to make this statement from the floor of the United States House of Representatives for all America and for history to know the stalwart warrior legacy left to us by the late great Ossie Davis.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, this bill is ludicrous on its face. At a time when billboards, TV ads, radio spots, neighborhood recruiting offices, and slick brochures too numerous to count, flood our consciousness, this Sense of Congress resolution asserts that recruiting on college campuses is a necessary part of military recruitment. According to this resolution, the Pentagon cares about cost- effectiveness; but the Pentagon has lost $2.3 trillion without explanation. It's been shameful in its award of no-bid contracts to insider corporations, and now, we're told that $9 billion of Iraq money has been ``lost.'' The thrust of this resolution is that it's cost effective and patriotic for the military to recruit on college campuses. Its supporters say that military recruiters ought to have the same access as businesses and corporations. But nowhere in this resolution is the one sure way to get good quality recruits ever mentioned. It's the tried and true way that businesses and corporations employ: they pay more. In reality, the Pentagon already has access to every 18-year-old male in our country. This resolution is totally unnecessary, unwarranted, and completely fails to make a convincing case. I urge a ``no'' vote on this resolution. U.S. ``Loses'' $9bn in Iraq Washington.--The U.S. occupation authority in Iraq was unable to keep track of nearly $9bn it transferred to government ministries, which lacked financial controls, security, communications and adequate staff, an inspector general has found. The U.S. officials relied on Iraqi audit agencies to account for the funds but those offices were not even functioning when the funds were transferred between October 2003 and June 2004, according to an audit by a special US inspector general. The findings were released on Sunday by Stuart Bowen, special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction. The official who led the CPA, L Paul Bremer III, submitted a blistering, written reply to the findings, saying the report had ``many misconceptions and inaccuracies,'' and lacked professional judgment. Bremer complained the report ``assumes that western-style budgeting and accounting procedures could be immediately and fully implemented in the midst of a war''. The inspector general said the occupying agency disbursed $8.8bn to Iraqi ministries ``without assurance the monies were properly accounted for''. U.S. officials, the report said, ``did not establish or implement sufficient managerial, financial and contractual controls.'' There was no way to verify that the money was used for its intended purposes of financing humanitarian needs, economic reconstruction, repair of facilities, disarmament and civil administration. Pentagon spokesperson Bryan Whitman said on Sunday the authority was hamstrung by ``extraordinary conditions'' under which it worked throughout it mission. ``We simply disagree with the audit's conclusion that the CPA provided less than adequate controls,'' Whitman said. Turning over the money ``was in keeping with the CPA's responsibility to transfer these funds and administrative responsibilities to the Iraqi ministries as an essential part of restoring Iraqi governance''. The inspector general cited an International Monetary Fund assessment in October, 2003 on the poor state of Iraqi government offices. The assessment found ministries suffered from staff shortages, poor security, disruptions in communications, damage and looting of government buildings, and lack of financial policies. CPA staff learned that 8,206 guards were on the payroll at one ministry, but only 602 could be accounted for, the report said. At another ministry, U.S. officials found 1,417 guards on the payroll but could only confirm 642. When staff members of the U.S. occupation government recommended that payrolls be verified before salary payments, CPA financial officials stated the CPA would rather overpay salaries than risk not paying employees and inciting violence,'' the inspector general said. The inspector general's report rejected Bremer's criticism. It concluded that despite the war, ``We believe the CPA management of Iraq's national budget process and oversight of Iraqi funds was burdened by severe inefficiencies and poor management.''

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, never have the issues been so clear as they are for all of us today. Our country is at war ostensibly to bring democracy to a far off country on the other side of our planet. At the same time, a significant chunk of the American people protest in their own humble ways for democracy at home. They see unequal protection of the precious right to vote blatant in Ohio but not only in Ohio; voting machines that cannot be trusted, casting votes for candidates not intended by the voter. That happened in my own race in my own State of Georgia. Provisional balloting made absurd by seemingly purposefully drafted arcane rules that in some case rendered the right to vote moot; our democracy entrusted to privately owned software run on computers that can be hacked, that overheat, break down or have their batteries die in the middle of the voting process; and, moreover, voting on machines that do not even tell us after we have voted who it is exactly that our vote was counted for. When Congress passed the Help America Vote Act, it hoped to correct the blatant irregularities and purposeful disenfranchisement that occurred in Florida in the 2000 election. It is clear from the work of the Committee on the Judiciary, the gentlewoman from Ohio (Mrs. Jones) and the tireless efforts of people across Ohio that this Congress has a lot of work to do. Our Vice President has told to us expect war for the next generation. It is not only our responsibility but our right to demand full democracy at home, and we do that by our actions today. This is not merely about bitterness or a recount, this is about a blackout. It is time to end the blackout and shine the lights on our precious right to vote.

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, many have suggested that those of us committed to seeing a complete and accurate count of the Ohio vote in this past November's Presidential race should simply ``just get over it''. Well this Member of Congress has sworn an oath to ``uphold and defend'' our nation's Constitution, and I do not believe that our commitment to Democracy is anything we should ``get over''. In fact, our commitment to democracy is something I believe we must deepen and expand until this dream is transformed into a reality for every citizen of this nation. But democracy is not to be achieved by an investment in the latest computer technology (even if computers can help us administer our elections). It is not achieved by rhetoric and flags, pomp and feel good myths of what a great nation we are. Democracy will only be achieved by listening closely to the intention of the voters and hearing clearly from them what a great nation they wish this to be. I'm afraid that has not happened in Ohio nor likely in other states this year. Predominantly African-American precincts and campus precincts saw localized shortages of voting machines leading to long lines frustrating would-be voters who left for work without casting a ballot. Precincts in affluent, white and Republican suburbs did not suffer such problems. Phone calls and fliers targeted African American voters sending them to vote on the wrong day at the wrong locations. Long-time voters ``disappeared'' from voting rolls. Voting machines ``defaulted'' to Bush votes regardless of which candidate the person voted for. People were forced to vote provisionally if they were in the right county but the wrong precinct. Sometimes the right precinct was literally only one table away. And as we did in Georgia--I'm sorry to say, too many voters in Ohio cast ballots on machines running trade secret protected, proprietary software, which produced no contemporaneously voter verified paper audit trail of their votes, leaving voters intentions subject to untraceable electronic manipulations. The Green and Libertarian Presidential candidates demanded a recount because the stories of vote suppression and manipulation were so blatant. Three thousand volunteers and six thousands contributors came together to make that recount possible. But Secretary Blackwell, charged with providing for free and fair elections for the people of Ohio fell short. While the law requires that precincts be selected randomly for spot checks, many counties hand-picked precincts in violation of the law. Ohio law requires that a discrepancy between the machine count and the hand count in a spot checked precinct lead to a full recount by hand of the entire county. But these hand recounts were not conducted as required. The integrity of the recount itself was put at risk by lax security for the ballots and the voting machines, which failed to maintain a chain of custody for election materials. Credentialled observers were denied an opportunity to meaningfully observe the recount process, were threatened with eviction for asking questions and completed their work still unable to assure the voters that the certified results accurately reflected the collective intention of the voters in their counties. The Ohio Secretary of State failed to provide adequate and uniform standards for the conduct of the recount. Perhaps as disturbing as anything else, was that Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell mixed his non-partisan duties to the voters of Ohio with his partisan duties as the co-chair of the his state's Bush Re-election campaign. We need: A Constitutional right to vote; Uniform standards for the conduct of elections and recounts; A contemporaneously produced voter verified paper trails for electronic voting machines; An end to the use of trade-secret protected, proprietary software for voting machines; Independent election commissions (or administrators) to oversee elections. (No campaign officials should ever again be placed in charge of counting or overseeing the vote); and The abolition of the Electoral College, replacing it with popular vote using Instant Runoff Voting. As can be learned at votecobb.ord, the recount documented wide spread evidence of fraud, the obstruction of legitimate votes (especially those cast by African Americans and young people), and computer voting machine manipulation. The Ohio recount was tainted by a lack of cooperation, the failure to follow consistent standards, and conflicts of interest by Republican election officials. A constituent of mine from Chamblee Georgia wrote that ``If Senate Democrats remain silent on Thursday, and we see a repeat of their 2000 endorsement of a manipulated election, the Democratic Party will have abandoned all claims to be the opposition. Americans who care about democracy and fair elections should understand such silence as an endorsement of the kind of Republican election engineering we witnessed in Ohio and of the Bush agenda.'' The founders ratified our Constitution, but under popular protest very quickly adopted a set of amendments demanded by the people. Among those first changes to our governing Constitution were two Amendments designed to ensure that our nation would continue to serve the people of this nation. The First Amendment guarantees our right to petition, speak, write and assemble: in short to organize politically to change our form of government. The Second Amendment was adopted to ensure the ``security of a free State.'' If we cannot protect the sanctity of the vote and those First Freedoms, we risk leaving our citizens no choice but to reach for the Second Amendment in their own defense. There have been 1,341 U.S. soldiers, including twenty-nine Georgians and two from my district that have so far lost their lives in our occupation of Iraq. I grieve with the families for their loss. But what are we to do when we attempt to export democracy abroad when we can't seem to even produce it at home.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, the party that controls the national government in India, the BJP, has enacted a ban on religious conversions in Tamil Nadu, a state which it controls. The law prohibits anyone from converting to any religion except Hinduism. Anyone who converts to a religion other than Hinduism can be imprisoned and can face a heavy fine. It officially targets conversions ``by force, allurement, or fraudulent means,'' but aren't all conversions by ``allurement,'' that ism, by persuasion presented by another person? Effectively, the new law prevents all conversions, except conversions to Hinduism. This is part of the fundamentalist Hindu nationalists' drive for Hindutva--a totally Hindu-dominated culture. ``Even if one converts of one's own free will, those involved in the conversion can be punished on the grounds that it's a forced conversion,'' said former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi. Yet the BJP and other groups under the umbrella of its parent organization, the RSS, have been forcibly reconverting people to Hinduism after they have converted to other religions of their own free will. According to the Washington Times of November 11, a Dalit group, the Dalit Panthers of India, is planning to have 25,000 of its members convert to Christianity. Another group of 10,000 Dalits in Chennai plan to convert to Buddhism on December 6 if this unjustified law is not repealed by then. Dalits, or ``Untouchables,'' are the lowest caste in Hinduism and their continuing oppression is essential to the preservation of the repressive Hindu social order. It is clear once again that there is no religious freedom in India. India's claims to be democratic are a lie if people cannot freely choose something as basic as their religion. This is more evidence that India is not the democracy it claims to be. America must speak up for the rights of all people in South Asia by cutting off our aid and trade to India, by imposing the sanctions the law mandates for violators of religious freedom, and by declaring openly our support for self-determination. Why can't the country that proudly claims to be the world's largest democracy settle its minority issues through a free and fair vote? That is the way that democratic countries do it, and it is the way world powers do it. As long as India refuses to do it, it will not be a member of either category. Mr. Speaker, I would like to place the article I referred to before into the Record at this time for additional information about the conversion ban. [lsqb]From the Washington Times, Nov. 11, 2002[rsqb] A Sawdust Trail for Low-Caste Hindus? (By Shaikh Azizur Rahman) New Delhi.--Low-caste Hindus in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu are threatening to embrace Christianity, Buddhism, or Islam to protest a new law that outlaws religious conversion. A bill passed into law by the state legislature last month penalizes those who convert to a religion other than Hinduism with imprisonment and a hefty fine. While religious minorities in Tamil Nadu plan to challenge the law in court, many Hindus from so-called ``untouchable castes,'' known as Dalits, are threatening to publicly defy the new law. One group of Dalit Hindus in the state capital, Chennai, said that a group of 10,000 will convert to Buddhism on Dec. 6 if the law is not revoked. Another group, known as the Dalit Panthers of India [lsqb]DPI[rsqb], pledged that 25,000 of its members would become Christians to protest what they called an ``unjustified'' decree. ``The upper class has been torturing the Dalits for centuries, and now, by passing the bill, the government has decided to shackle us in a society where we are denied even our basic democratic rights,'' said one Dalit activist, who identified himself by the Christian name Emmanuel. On Oct. 31, Tamil Nadu became the first--but probably not the last--Indian state to outlaw religious conversions. Though the law targets conversions ``by force, allurement or fraudulent means,'' opponents say the language offers the means to challenge all conversions to faiths other than Hinduism. ``Even if one changes one's religion of one's own free will, those involved in the conversion can be punished on the ground that it's a case of forced conversion,'' said M. Karunanidhi a former chief minister of Tamil Nadu. The new law was welcomed by Hindu fundamentalists, who govern the nation in a coalition led by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). ``The BJP is strongly of the view that this law is most necessary for the whole country. Lots of money is coming into the country from Islamic organizations to aid conversions,'' said BJP President M. Venkaiah Naidu. Ashok Singhal, leader of the World Hindu Council (VHP), hailed the law as a ``timely and bold step'' and he urged other states to pass similar laws. The issue of religious conversion has long been a source of strife in India. While federal law allows Indians to change their faith, the ruling BJP makes no secret of its dislike of the practice, while its ruling partner--the VHP party--views conversions as betrayal. Opponents of the new law warn it will only trigger an even larger exodus of Hindus to other faiths. The Global Council of Indian Christians said it was ``alarmed by the hurriedly promulgated ordinance,'' and called it ``the most heinous violation of religious freedom aimed at targeting Christian missionaries engaged in poverty alleviation and spreading the light of education.'' The All- India Christian People's Forum said that it went against the core of the Constitution. ``This ordinance is uncalled for, unwarranted and smacks of a pro-Hindu ideological bias of the government''. ``The bill runs foul of Article 25 [lsqb]25[rsqb] of the Indian Constitution, which grants freedom of conscience and free profession, practice and propagation of religion to every Indian citizen,'' the group said. Dominic Emmanuel, director of New Delhi Catholic Archdiocese, called the measure, ``an assault as much on civil rights as on human dignity.'' John Daya, secretary-general of the Christian Council in New Delhi, said: ``In fact, the only inducements by fraud and fear are those being carried out by [lsqb]Hindu organizations[rsqb] in the tribal belt, where innocent tribals are being forced to become Hindus.'' Muslims, too, are concerned. ``How can conversions be prevented if an individual is attracted to another religion because of his or her faith in it? Force is never used to convert one to Islam because it is against the basic tenets of [lsqb]Islam[rsqb],'' said Maolana Siddikullah Chowdhury, general secretary of the Jamiat-e-Ulema party in Calcutta. He added that low-caste Hindus converted to Islam simply to ``escape discrimination and ill treatment'' and not under any coercion.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to call attention to a forgotten disease, which is anything but forgotten right now in my congressional district. A number of students and administrators at Tucker High School in DeKalb County, Georgia are learning more than they care to know about tuberculosis. Last week, about 200 Tucker High School students and staff had to be tested and treated after someone at the high school tested positive for tuberculosis. Tuberculosis is the forgotten disease, and as history continues to show us every time we forget and ignore TB, we are doomed to repeat history with continued outbreaks of tuberculosis as well as stronger strains of the disease such as multi-drug resistant tuberculosis. Every time government agencies are forced to cut back on funding for tuberculosis programs the rate of infection increases in populations who need our help the most. Tuberculosis is truly a global disease, with more than 2 billion people around the world carrying the infection. Right here in the United States, the South has one of the highest rates of TB infection because of the vast health disparities between blacks and whites. African Americans have higher rates of TB in the United States because of poverty conditions in the South and in urban areas. Because of that poverty, African American also have a difficult time accessing tuberculosis medications and primary care treatment for the disease. That is why I am a co-sponsor of H.R. 1167: The Comprehensive Tuberculosis Elimination Act of 2001 and H.R. 1168: The Stop TB Now Act. This legislation effectively implements recommendations listed in an Institute of Medicine report entitled ``Ending Neglect: The Elimination of Tuberculosis in the United States''. These recommendations attack tuberculosis on a national and international level. The legislation does so by increasing the authorized funding levels for both the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as well as the National Institutes of Health (NIH), giving them more ammunition to fight this treacherous disease here in the United States and abroad. We in the Congress have an unprecedented opportunity to eliminate tuberculosis in the United States and reduce this scourge, so other high schools do not have to go through the same trauma and interruption of their daily lives as the students, staff, and faculty have faced at Tucker High School. I urge the House of Representatives to pass H.R. 1167: The Comprehensive Tuberculosis Elimination Act of 2001 and H.R. 1168: The Stop TB Now Act.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, one of the things I have been proud of in my time in Congress is the opportunity I have had to help inform people about human rights and the struggle for freedom in the world. In that light, I would like to take this opportunity to note the fifteenth anniversary of the declaration of independence by the Sikh Nation of Khalistan which occurred on October 7, 1987, and the formation of the Council of Khalistan at that time. The Council of Khalistan leads the Sikhs in their struggle to free themselves from repression, corruption, and tyranny imposed on them by India. It has always conducted that struggle in a peaceful, democratic, nonviolent way and has explicitly rejected militancy. I am proud to have been able to help the Council inform people about the Sikhs' struggle for freedom. The President of the Council of Khalistan, Dr. Gurmit Singh Aulakh, has been tireless in fighting for freedom in the subcontinent. I am proud to know him. I wish everyone in Washington were so tireless, and I wish him success in his endeavors. I would like to congratulate Dr. Aulakh and the Council of Khalistan on this occasion and I would like to wish them a successful convention this coming weekend in Philadelphia. Last year's convention was in my home town, Atlanta. Mr. Speaker, I hope my colleagues will Join me in congratulating the Council of Khalistan on this important milestone.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, I share the same revulsion that many others have toward Saddam Hussein. We all know that he is brutal and that his regime has terrorized the Iraqi people and the peoples of nearby countries. But there was a time not so long ago when, despite all of this, we chose to allow him to be our friend. There was a time when we supplied him with chemical weapons and other military technology. If our Nation really cared about Iraq's neighbors, we would never have supplied him the military arsenal that we did. And if we really cared about his people, we would have done something to alleviate the suffering of the Kurds, who for years have been brutalized by the Iraqi military. If we cared about the Iraqi people, we would have done something to lift the burdens imposed on them by U.N. sanctions, which to date have claimed in excess of an estimated 500,000 Iraqi children. But the truth is we did not really care about any of that suffering. Madeline Albright even said that the price of 500,000 dead Iraqi children was worth it. Now, however, we claim to care. Now, Saddam Hussein has just become another name on a long list of other tyrants who we once aided and abetted but now oppose. But what to do? In the past, other tyrants we have grown tired of were assassinated, like Jonas Savimbi; or charged with war crimes, like Slobodan Milosevic; or forced from power through U.S.-backed uprisings, like Mobutu Sese Seko. President Bush is confronted with the ``what to do question.'' He appears to be choosing war to get rid of this tyrant; and, of course, he has to justify it. That is the public relations part of the equation. The words ``Gulf of Tonkin'' have echoed around Washington this last month, with many people concerned that the Bush Administration is now manufacturing an international crisis in order to launch a preemptive military strike against Saddam Hussein. In 1964, there were some courageous Members of this House who knew that the Gulf of Tonkin incident was a political ruse being used by the Johnson administration in order to justify the United States going to war in Vietnam. For their courage to speak out and resist, they suffered a tidal wave of public ridicule. But we now know that they were right and that the Vietnam War was a monumental mistake that cost the lives of some 60,000 brave young Americans and hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese. And, still, we have many Americans and Vietnamese who suffer the health effects of Agent Orange and other toxins faced on the battlefield. And all across the American and European landscape today, veterans still suffer from Gulf War Syndrome and exposure to depleted uranium. Will we let this President create yet another generation of veterans to whom we have broken our promise? I see too many of these veterans sleeping on our streets. The President can see them, too, if he would just look. They sleep on the sidewalks, the benches and the heating vents just across the street from the White House. And, sadly, one of the first things our President did after he declared this war on terrorism was to deprive our young men and women who are now fighting on the front lines of their high deployment overtime pay. He does not even want to pay them. Mr. Speaker, do we give this President the green light to go to war with Iraq based on evidence which many weapons experts believe to be exaggerated? Are we now turning a blind eye to another Gulf of Tonkin- type incident? Should we not trust the legal and diplomatic means of the United Nations? Do we give the President the green light to go to war in Iraq because it has refused to comply with U.N. Security Council weapons inspections resolutions? At the same time, Israel refuses to comply with U.N. resolutions with respect to the occupied territories. Do we have different standards for different countries? Mr. Speaker, the Cuban missile crisis and the Gulf of Tonkin, if they taught us anything, they taught us the dangers of choosing the military option over diplomatic and legal alternatives. The current terrorist crisis confronting our Nation is so much bigger and more complicated than this call for war on Iraq. Should we miscalculate our military actions in Iraq, we could cause many American servicemen and women to lose their lives. Needless to say, we could also cause untold numbers of Iraqis to be killed or injured. Worse still, instead of solving the current threat of terrorism against us, going to war in Iraq might well make things far worse for us, both at home and abroad. I hope and pray that we choose our options carefully; and, for that reason, I will be voting no on this resolution to go to war in Iraq.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise to remember our colleague, Representative Patsy Mink. It was with great sadness that I learned of the death of my friend and colleague, Congresswoman Patsy Mink this weekend. I offer my deepest condolences to Patsy's family, her constituents, and the State of Hawaii. Her passing is a loss to us all. Patsy was a leader on many issues during her 23-year tenure in Congress, and I believe that she truly did do what many, if not all Representatives seek to accomplish here in Washington, DC--she made a difference. Patsy was the co-author for Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972, which mandated gender equality in education. Thanks to her work, millions of women were afforded greater access to education, school grants and scholarships, and athletic opportunities. Patsy was also a leader on an issue that is close to my heart, the Freedom of Information Act. In 1971, Patsy filed suit along with 32 other Members of Congress to force disclosure of reports on underground nuclear attacks in the Aleutian Islands of Alaska. This case was later cited as precedent by the U.S. Supreme Court in its ruling for the release of the Watergate tapes. Patsy Mink was also an advocate for the protection and conservation of the natural resources of our Nation, and of Hawaii. A former assistant secretary of state for Oceans and International, Environmental and Scientific Affairs, where she helped strengthen protection of whales and regulations of toxic dumping and ocean mining, Patsy brought her advocacy back to Congress with her. In the 107th Congress, she introduced legislation to create the East Maui National Heritage Area, to expand the Pu'uhonua Honaunau National Historic Park, and to establish the Kalaupapa National Historic Park. Further, Patsy was involved in the successful effort to reform laws permitting strip mining. It is fitting then that Patsy was a recipient of the Friends of the National Parks Award from the National Parks Conservation Association. On these, and many other fronts, Patsy was a dedicated and devoted leader and champion. I consider it a privilege to have served with Patsy, and I believe that Congress has lost an important and respected Member.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, recently a seminar was held in New York on the oppression of minorities in Hindu nationalist India. One of the speakers was the Sikh scholar and author Gurtej Singh, Professor of Sikhism. He is also the author of the book Chakravyuh: Web of Indian Secularism. Professor Gurtej Singh discussed the history of Sikh independence and the Sikh religion. He exposed the connivance of Sikh leaders of all parties with the Indian government. He discussed the efforts of the Hindu nationalists to absorb the Sikh religion. Professor Gurtej Singh has been honored by the Shiromani Gudrwara Prabandhak Committee, which runs the Gurdwaras (Sikh temples) in Punjab, Khalistan. He is a very well respected Sikh scholar. The information he discussed underlies the need for the Sikhs in Punjab, Khalistan to work to achieve their freedom. Unfortunately, the Indian government has recently reaffirmed through its Ambassador to the U.S. that it will hold a plebiscite in Kashmir, as it promised in 1948, or in Punjab. Since the United States was formed to be the bastion of freedom, we owe it to the people there to do what we can to support their freedom efforts. We should declare our support for a free and fair plebiscite in Punjab, Khalistan, in Kashmir, in primilarly Christian Nagaland, and elsewhere in the subcontinent where people are seeking freedom and independence. The democratic way is the best way to resolve issues. Until all people in India enjoy the full civil rights of democratic citizens, until human rights are respected, India should receive no American aid or trade. This is the best way that America can help bring freedom to that troubled region. Mr. Speaker, the Council of Khalistan recently published a press release commending Professor Gurtej Singh for his work for human rights and his presentation at the New York panel. I would like to insert this press release into the Record at this time. S. Gurtej Singh Exposes Indian Tyranny at Seminar Washington, D.C., May 16, 2002.--The Sikh Nation appreciates the contributions of S. Gurtej Singh IAS, who spoke at a seminar in New York last week. He exposed the genocide of the Indian government and the betrayal and corruption of the Akali Dal leadership in his book, Chakravyuh: Web of Indian Secularism, and in his speech he gave historical facts about the sovereign, independent Sikh state and the independence of the Sikh religion since its inception. He explained how the Hindu majority wants to assimilate the Sikh religion and establish a Hindu Rashtra. We recommend that everyone read his book. ``S. Gurtej Singh has done an excellent job of exposing the connivance of the Akali leaders, such as Badal, Tohra, and Mann, with the Indian government in its campaign of terror against the Sikh Nation,'' said Dr. Gurmit Singh Aulakh, President of the Council of Khalistan. ``He is to be saluted,'' Dr. Aulakh said. ``The Sikh Nation needs more good Sikhs like S. Gurtej Singh if it is ever to end the oppression.'' The Council of Khalistan is the government pro tempore of Khalistan, the Sikh homeland that declared its independence from India on October 7, 1987. The Council of Khalistan leads the Sikh Nation's struggle for independence. ``Gurtej Singh's presentation was excellent and he made a detailed presentation of the abuses and oppression of the Sikh Nation,'' Dr. Aulakh said. ``The time has come to throw out the conniving Sikh leadership of the Akalis and Congress and unite behind committed, principled, pro-Sikh leaders who are committed to freedom,'' he said. The Indian government has murdered over 250,000 Sikhs since 1984. Over 75,000 Kashmiri Muslims have been killed since 1988. More than 200,000 Christians have been killed since 1947, along with tens of thousands of Dalits, Tamils, Assamese, Bodos, Manipuris, and other minorities. Last month, police stood by as militant Hindus attacked Muslims in Gujarat. Over 5000 people died, according to the Indian newspaper The Hindu. The Indian government paid twice as much compensation to the families of Hindus who were killed as it paid to Muslims who were killed. The U.S. State Department reported in 1994 that the Indian government paid out over 41,000 cash bounties to police officers for killing Sikhs. Since Christmas 1998, a wave of violence against Christians has seen priests murdered, nuns being raped, churches being burned, Christian schools and prayer halls destroyed, and no one has been punished for these acts. Militant Hindu fundamentalists allied with the pro-Fascist RSS, the parent organization of the ruling BJP, burned missionary Graham Staines and his two young sons to death. ``For the survival of the Sikh Nation, the time has come to launch a Shantmai Morcha (peaceful agitation) to liberate Khalistan from Indian occupation,'' Dr. Aulakh said. ``I call on the Sikh leadership in Punjab to begin a Shantmai Morcha immediately. If they will not, the Sikh Nation should rid itself of them and support leaders who will do so,'' he said. ``I also call on the United States government to support freedom for Khalistan and the other minority nations seeking their freedom from India,'' he said. ``Sikhs are a separate nation and ruled Punjab until 1849. No Sikh has signed the Indian constitution,'' Dr. Aulakh said. Sikhism is a sovereign, independent, monotheistic religion which believes in the equality of the whole human race, including gender equality. Sikhs pray every day for the well being of all humanity. The Sikh Nation was established as sovereign. Guru gave political power to the Sikh Nation. (``In Grieb Sikhan Ko Deon Patshahi.'') ``Freedom and self- determination are the birthright of all peoples and nations. The people of South Asia must have self-determination now,'' Dr. Aulakh said. ``India is on the verge of disintegration,'' he said. ``Khalistan will be free by 2008.''

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, no government can govern without the consent of the governed. That is one of the founding principles of America. Earlier this year, my friend Dr. Gurmit Singh Aulakh, President of the Council of Khalistan, issued a ``New Year's Message to the Sikh Nation.'' In it, he noted that India is governing the Sikhs of Punjab, Khalistan, the Christians of Nagaland, the Muslims of Kashmir, and many other minority nations without their consent. In the letter, the Council of Khalistan said that the elections earlier this year in Punjab won't have any effect in terms of freeing the people, but merely change the facts of the oppressors. The letter noted that in the likely event of a war between India and Pakistan, it will be the Sikhs and the Kashmiris who will be the primary victims. He called on Sikhs not to fight for India. He reminded us that no Sikh representative ever signed India's constitution. How can India's constitution be binding on the Sikhs when they have never been a party to it? Dr. Aulakh wrote that India is not one country and is just a remnant of British colonialism. He wrote that its breakup is inevitable. On January 25, Indian Home Minister L.K. Advani admitted that when Kashmir leaves India, India will unravel. That is why India is so scared of the 17 freedom movements within its borders. There is clear sentiment for freedom within India's borders, Mr. Speaker. We must do what we can to help that cause along. What can America do to help the cause of freedom in South Asia? For one thing, we can try to keep India and Pakistan at peace. Unfortunately, there has already been firing across the Line of Control in Kashmir. We should use our diplomatic power to stop the fighting before it becomes all-out war. Both sides have nuclear weapons, Mr. Speaker, and the Pakistani government has been quite helpful to us in the war on terror, at least until India's military maneuvers forced them to divert troops to the Indian-Pakinstani border. We should stop our aid to India to help stop the atrocities against Sikhs, Christians, Kashmiri Muslims, dark-skinned Dalit ``untouchables,'' and others. We should also publicly declare our support for self-determination for Khalistan, Kashmir, Nagaland, and all the minority nations and peoples seeking their freedom from India. Mr. Speaker, the Council of Khalistan's open letter is very informative. I think my colleagues will be very well informed by reading it. Therefore, I would like to place it in the Record now. Council of Khalistan, Washington, DC, January 3, 2002. Khalsa Ji: Wahe Guru Ji Ka Khalsa, Wahe Guru Ji Ki Fateh! Happy New Year to you and your family and friends. May 2002 be the best year you have ever had. At the dawn of a new year, freedom for Khalistan is closer than ever. India is showing its instability. The Indian government is so desperate that it was caught red-handed murdering. Sikh girls in Kashmir. Just as it did in Chithisinghpora, the regime is committing terrorist acts to try to set minority nations against one another in pursuit of India's ongoing drive for hegemony in South Asia. On May 27, several Indian soldiers were caught red-handed trying to set fire to a Gurdwara and some Sikh homes in Kashmir. Sikh and Muslim residents of the village overwhelmed the troops and stopped them from carrying out this atrocity. Now India has set up another terrorist incident that has cost the lives of at least three Sikh girls. India has massed large numbers of troops and warheads on the border. Unfortunately, the upcoming war will result in the deaths of many Sikhs, Kashmiris, and other minorities, exactly the result the Indian government wants. I urge Sikhs not to support India. Punjab and Kashmir will be the main battlegrounds. Sikhs will be killed in the upcoming war more than any other people will, as they have in every war in the past. It is Sikhs who will suffer the most, and that suffering would be made worse by shedding Sikh blood for the oppressors of the Sikh Nation. We do not have a choice of peace or war. The Sikh Nation has a right to choose peace, and that choice requires the independence of Khalistan. To save Sikh lives, do not fight with the Hindu slavemasters. Instead, work to liberate Khalistan. This is an ideal opportunity to begin a Shantmai Morcha and form a Khalsa Raj Party to achieve independence for Khalistan and to liberate the other countries seeking their freedom from Indian occupation. Take advantage of this opportunity. Fight to free Khalistan. Remember the words of former Akal Takht Jathedar Professor Darshan Singh: ``If a Sikh is not Khalistani, he is not a Sikh.'' Self-determination is the right of all people and nations. India is not one nation. It has 18 official languages. The Sikh Nation's sentiment for Khalistan is clear. Pro-Khalistan handbills were handed out at the Golden Temple on June 7 during the commemoration of Gallughara Divas and Sant Bhindranwale's martyrdom. Ajmer Singh Lakhowal, the head of the Bharat Kisan Union, has called for self-determination for the Sikhs. The flame of freedom burns bright in the hearts of the Sikhs. India wants to wipe out minority nations so that they cannot ask for their freedom. To achieve that objective, the Indian government has murdered over 250,000 Sikhs since 1984, over 200,000 Christians in Nagaland since 1947, more than 75,000 Kashmiri Muslims since 1988, and tens of thousands of Dalits (dark-skinned ``Untouchables,'' the aboriginal people of South Asia), Tamils, Bodos, Assamese, Manipuris, and others. The Deccan Chronicle reported that the Indian government knew of the attack on Parliament, which killed 13 people, in advance and did nothing. The Indian army carried out the attack to provide a pretext for an attack on Pakistan and Kashmir. It hopes to use the killings of young Sikh girls to get Sikh to fight against Kashmiris. India has a long record of terrorism. In November 1994, the Indian newspaper Hitavada reported that the Indian government paid the late governor of Punjab, Surendra Nath, approximately $1.5 billion to organize and support covert state terrorism in Punjab, Khalistan, and in Kashmir. The book Soft Target, written by two very respected journalists from the Toronto Star and the Toronto Globe and Mail, conclusively establishes that the Indian government blew up its own airliner in 1985, killing 329 innocent people. According to India Today, the Indian government created the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and put up LTTE leaders in New Delhi's finest hotel. According to journalist Justin Raimondo of www.antiwar.com, George Fernandes, now the Defense Minister, even raised funds for the LTTE. The LTTE were created to stoop a U.S. broadcast tower in Sri Lanka. The Indian government turned on the LTTE because the LTTE nows seeks an independent country for Tamils. A report issued in April by the Movement Against State Repression (MASR) shows that India admitted that it held 52,268 political prisoners under the totalitarian ``Terrorist and Disruptive Activities Act'' (TADA), which expired in 1995. Persons arrested under TADA are routinely re-arrested upon their release. Cases were routinely registered against Sikh activists under TADA in states other than Punjab to give the police an excuse to continue holding them. The MASR report quotes the Punjab Civil Magistracy as writing ``If we add up the figures of the last few years the number of innocent persons killed would run into lakhs [lsqb]hundreds of thousands.[rsqb]'' As General Narinder Singh has said, ``Punjab is a police state.'' These Sikh political prisoners and the tens of thousands of other political prisoners held in India must be released immediately. Even before their release, the political prisoners should also be given the Khalsa Raj Party nomination for the seats in the Legislative Assembly, the SGPC, and when the parliamentary elections come up, for Parliament. The Sikh Nation will vote for these Sikh political prisoners, as they are the heroes of the Sikh Nation. No government can govern without the consent of the governed. The present Akali leadership of Badal, Tohra, Mann and others are the agents of the Indian government and are under their control. Do not trust them. Remember, Badal promised during the last election campaign that he would release Sikh political prisoners, punish guilty police officials who committed atrocities against the Sikh, and from a commission to investigate atrocities committed against the Sikhs since 1984. In 1947, when India was divided, the cunning and deceitful Hindu leadership promised that Sikhs would have the glow of freedom in Punjab and that no law affecting Sikh rights would be passed without Sikh consent. As soon as the transfer of power had occurred and India was free, those promises were broken. Instead, India began its effort to wipe out the Sikh people, the Sikh Nation, and the Sikh religion. The Sikh Nation must regain its sovereignty to survive. Sikh gave over 80 percent of the sacrifices to free India from the British. At that time, they were only 1.6 percent of the population. Sikhs are the ones who suffered the most after the freedom and partition of India. The Khalsa Panth can do it again to free itself from the slavery of Hindu India. A free Khalistan will bring prosperity to the people of Punjab farmers will be able to sell their produce at high prices in the international market and buy cheaper fertilizers, insecticides, and seeds. Farm produce will not lie in the market for weeks without buyers as it did during the sale of the rice crop last year. We must have a full, free, and fair plebiscite on the status of Khalistan and we must launch a Shantmai Morcha to liberate our homeland. Let us take this opportunity to bring freedom to our homeland and all the countries of South Asia. Panth Da Sewadar, Dr. Gurmit Singh Aulakh, President, Council of Khalistan.

Ms. McKINNEY

Ms. McKINNEY. Mr. Speaker, on June 4, an interesting article appeared at Islam Online, an Internet news site. It said that the People's Union for Democratic Rights (PUDR) had found that the recent violence in Gujarat in which, according to The Hindu newspaper, over 5,000 people were killed, was a planned pogrom designed to reduce Muslims to second- class citizens. Unfortunately, Muslim and other minorities such as Christians, Sikhs, and others are already second-class citizens in India. The article says that the violence was well organized and planned long before the train attack in Godhra. It reports, that ``the organizers of the carnage tapped on a seam of hatred, based on anti- Muslim propaganda which had been carefully cultivated over many years.'' It clearly points the finger at the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and the Bajrang Dal, militant Hindu fundamentalists organizations inclined to violence which are under the umbrella of the militant, Hindu nationalist, pro-Fascist Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS), whose political wing is the BJP, the party that leads India's government. It was the RSS that published a booklet last year on how to implicate Christians and other religious minorities in fake criminal cases. It was the VHP that murdered missionary Graham Staines, yet has not been punished for it. In New York a couple of years ago, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee told an audience proudly, ``I will always be a Swayamsewak''. This reveals the reality of so-called democracy in India. It is a democracy for the Brahmins, but it is a tyranny for the minorities. We should stop our aid to India until they allow human rights and we should declare our support for self-determination for all the people living within its borders. Otherwise, I am afraid, violence will be even more a way of life in South Asia than it already is, and that would be a tragedy for all the people there. If we can do anything to prevent that, we should do so. Mr. Speaker, I would like to add the Islam Online article to the Record at this time to give more detail on the pogrom in Gujarat. Gujarat Pogrom Aimed at Reducing Muslims to Second Class Citizens New Delhi, June 3 (IslamOnline).--The People's Union for Democratic Rights (PUDR), one of India's premiere human rights organizations, said in its report on the violence in Gujarat, ``The whole intent of the pogrom has been to reduce Muslims to second class citizens in their own country.'' The PUDR is a well-known independent human rights organization in India monitoring human rights violations against minorities and weaker sections of society. The PUDR report ``Maaro, Kaapo, Baaro: State, Society and Communalism in Gujarat'' said that the organizers of the carnage tapped on a seam of hatred, based on anti-Muslim propaganda which had been carefully cultivated over many years. The report said that the anti-Muslim carnage was planned well before the Godhra train tragedy. It says that the hate propaganda increased in the six months prior to February 2002. The PUDR report says that the VHP (World Hindu Council) and its youth wing, the Bajrang Dal, organized trishul (tridents) distribution ceremonies in villages with Muslim populations. Speeches were made abusing and threatening Muslims during these ceremonies. The report gives the instance of Pandarwada village where one of the worst massacres and sexual abuse cases took place. A meeting was held in this village about a fortnight before the attack. The PUDR report provides detailed lists of people named as organizers and attackers. Many of these are functionaries of the ruling party, BJP, the VHP and the Bajrang Dal. The report gives a list of victims in some of the mass killings, which establishes that their numbers were higher than the ones the government admits. The PUDR has accused the state government of abetting the anti-Muslim pogrom. ``The fact that the Gujarat government supported the bandh (general strike) of February 28 and March 1 despite its experience of large-scale violence against Muslims after a similar bandh in 2000, is evidence of its complicity in the violence right from the start,'' it said. The report also accuses the judiciary of not performing its duty. It illustrates as to how the criminal justice system in the state is complicit in the denial of justice to the riot victims. It corroborates the widely-reported fact that the police make a mockery of the investigative process. And that even courts have shown reluctance to do their duty. The PUDR team visited 21 relief camps and 75 villages and towns where it spoke to government officials, members of traders' associations, the VHP, the Jamait-e-Ulema-e Hind and NGOs. It has demanded the Narendra Modi government in Gujarat be dismissed and asked for an independent probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation into major incidents of communal violence, and expressed doubts over the Modi government's intentions to take action against the perpetrators of riots.