Zoe Lofgren: “there is one thing we all agree upon, we are grateful to our troops and their families. We respect the men and women in…”

“there is one thing we all agree upon, we are grateful to our troops and their families. We respect the men and women in our Armed Forces, and we admire their patriotism and bravery. We all recognize that no matter what the policy disagreements about the steps that took us to this day of invasion, our troops are doing their duty and putting their bodies on the line for our country. They are in our prayers, and we all hope for a speedy conclusion and a safe return for each of them. How fine it would have been if the right-wingers in charge of this House had put aside their partisanship for just this evening and agreed to write a clean resolution that supported our troops; but no. One can always count on them to try to wedge an issue, divide people and make partisan what should be purely American. There are plenty of things in this resolution that are just not true, but I am going to vote for it because of clause 2 and 3. I do support and appreciate our Armed Forces and their families. I cannot say the same thing about the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) and the rest of the Republican leaders who once again have proven by their actions this evening that they are more interested in partisan advantage for their party than unity and success for our country. They dishonor our soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines who are the real patriots we seek to honor by this resolution.”