Brian Jones: “I am on the floor again today with a prophetic political cartoon. In the cartoon, Uncle Sam is in a wheelchair, and he…”

“I am on the floor again today with a prophetic political cartoon. In the cartoon, Uncle Sam is in a wheelchair, and he is at the edge of a cliff that is known as the fiscal cliff. Then, he has President Obama pushing him in the wheelchair; and then the donkey, representing the Democratic Party, is pushing Mr. Obama. And then the elephant, representing the Republican Party, is pushing the donkey and President Obama to push Uncle Sam off the cliff. What is ironic is that Uncle Sam is yelling like he is excited: ``I can see Greece from here.'' Well, we know what has happened to the economy of Greece. It is in total collapse. Mr. Speaker, we are $19.2 trillion in debt. I was here in the year 2000 when Bill Clinton left office. We were the majority in the House and the Senate. We were headed for a surplus. The debt in 2000 was $5.6 trillion. Now we are here 16 years later and it is $19.2 trillion. The reason I bring this up is because we have an opportunity to stop spending billions and billions of dollars in Afghanistan. It is nothing but a waste. It is a waste of our young men and women in uniform. It is a waste of the taxpayers' money. Recently, in an article in The Washington Post titled ``Former Afghan Leader Karzai: Military Action Cannot Resolve Conflict in Afghanistan,'' the former President of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai, told The Washington Post recently that he doesn't think a military effort will bring peace to Afghanistan.…”