Brian Jones: “Let me quote from Roger Simon in a recent article, titled, ``Down the Opium Rathole.'' Mr. Simon writes about…”

“Let me quote from Roger Simon in a recent article, titled, ``Down the Opium Rathole.'' Mr. Simon writes about Afghanistan: If you spent 13 years pounding money down a rathole with little to show for it, you might wake up one morning and say, ``Hey, I'm going to stop pounding money down the rathole.'' Unfortunately, the United States Government does not think this way. Mr. Speaker, last week we passed a $585 billion bill known as the defense bill, with a large percentage of that money going into overseas contingencies: Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria. I question how much damage this bill causes our military Active Duty and our retirees. Let me quote from Lori Falkner Volkman, a former prosecutor and spokesman for the Keep Your Promise Alliance, an online coalition of military families and organizations. She said: ``This is the second Christmas in a row that national leaders have tried to cut military pay benefits. Earned benefits should not even be on the table when entitlement budgets soar and appropriations budgets are billions of dollars over budget.'' I did not vote for the NDAA bill. It was 1,648 pages, and we did not have enough time to read and comprehend the contents of the bill.…”