Lynn C. Woolsey: “maybe I am just too simple, but today's debate, today's argument for an extended missile defense system, takes me back…”

“maybe I am just too simple, but today's debate, today's argument for an extended missile defense system, takes me back to the 1950s when I was in school. At least weekly while I was in grade school every student and our teachers went under our desks to practice protection against the atom bomb. Mr. Speaker, I can assure my colleagues we have a false sense of security, and it all came from these exercises. Now I question just how safe we could be with this missile defense technology against rogue States. Mr. Speaker, what are we really investing in? I fear what we will be investing in is a false sense of security. I would suggest that instead we invest in true security. We can spend our scarce Federal dollars on technologies to protect us from the unknown, or we can use these scarce resources to keep our country secure by investing in humanitarian relations with other nations around the world. For example, if we want to get serious about our nation's defense, we should be investing in programs that will prepare us to confront the international challenges we actually face and keep nuclear materials out of the hands of terrorists and rogue nations. This is a more effective tool for nonproliferation than Star Wars will ever be. This is where we should be investing our scarce dollars. There is an even greater way that we can invest and that we can ensure national security. We can invest in our children.…”