Lynn C. Woolsey: “Tonight when the President of the United States addresses our Nation from this Chamber, we will hear some good news on…”

“Tonight when the President of the United States addresses our Nation from this Chamber, we will hear some good news on the national security front. The end of the Iraq war, for example, is an impressive accomplishment, one that wouldn't have happened if bold progressives hadn't called for our troops to be brought home way back in 2005. I'm also pleased the President's leadership will make it possible for our military strategic review to call for significant reductions in defense spending. But on both of these fronts, ending our current wars and long-range national security strategy, I'm hoping for proposals that are bigger and bolder than what we've heard to this point. Bottom line, Mr. Speaker, we need to end the war in Afghanistan, and we need to end it now, not 2014. Not at whatever other later date the military brass decides is appropriate. After nearly 1,900 American deaths and more than 10 years of bloodshed and mayhem, we owe it to our troops and to their families, as well as American taxpayers, to bring them home. This war is not just a moral disgrace, not just a humanitarian disaster, Mr. Speaker; it's a strategic failure. We're spending at least $10 billion every month to prop up a regime in Afghanistan that is ineffective on its best day and downright corrupt on its worst.…”