Brian Jones: “I want to thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Kucinich) for yielding me half of his time, and I yield myself such time as…”

“I want to thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Kucinich) for yielding me half of his time, and I yield myself such time as I may consume. {time} 1110 Mr. Speaker, we are debating how long we are going to be in Afghanistan. Recently, Secretary Gates testified before the Armed Services Committee, which I serve on, and said that he thought by 2014 we could start substantial reduction in our troop strength in Afghanistan, 2014, that it might be 2015, 2016. That's why this debate and this resolution is so important, not important for those of us in the House, but important for our military and the American people. And Mr. Kucinich did make reference to The Washington Post-ABC poll that was taken a couple of days ago that said 73 percent of the American people said it's time, this year, to bring our troops home. In addition, I would like to share a quote from the leader of Afghanistan, Mr. Karzai. He's our man in Afghanistan. All right, now, he's our man. This was his quote 3 days ago: ``I request that NATO and America should stop these operations on our soil,'' Karzai said. ``This war is not on our soil. If this war is against terror, then this war is not here. Terror is not here.'' The number of al Qaeda and their presence in Afghanistan is about 20 or 30. Most of them are in Pakistan. I would agree with that. But this debate is critical.…”