Robert C. Byrd: “To start--in an appropriations supplemental, a multiyear appropriations request, strikes me to be very, very strange.”

The Department is firmly committed to working closely and openly with Congress in order to protect the health of our servicemembers.

I cannot support this item unless there are some limitations on it, unless Congress can exercise its power over the purse, as the Constitution provides.

In closing, may I say that the President's request includes $658 million for construction of the U.S. Embassy in Iraq.

Our service men and women, now more than ever, are depending on your leadership to put the military medical system on a new track.