Janice Schakowsky: “On August 6, I was in Iraq. What I learned from that visit that day was that in fact that the President's surge has…”

“On August 6, I was in Iraq. What I learned from that visit that day was that in fact that the President's surge has failed and that there is no end in sight for the war in Iraq. I learned that first by talking with the Deputy Prime Minister of Iraq that day who said that the night before that former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi had pulled his people out of the Parliament, and the week before the Sunnis had left, and then what was remaining of the Parliament was on vacation. And he said that there wasn't going to be any political settlement by this September, nor would there be by next September, and he didn't say which September. The point of that is the reason for the surge was promoted by the President and by General Petraeus as creating the space for political settlements in Iraq, which have not only not happened but we have even seen steps backwards. But what is really important today is that people examine the so-called evidence that progress has been made, and that is why I brought a few charts here.”