Janice Schakowsky: “I just returned from the White House meeting along with the Congressional Black Caucus that was kind enough to let me…”

“I just returned from the White House meeting along with the Congressional Black Caucus that was kind enough to let me come along, in a meeting with Secretary of State Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice and the President, and we were talking about the crisis in Haiti right now. And one of the reasons now given for our going to Iraq was to liberate Iraq, to bring democracy to Iraq. And we stand here right now at a moment when violence and thugs and M-16s are moving toward the palace of the democratically elected President of Haiti, Mr. Aristide, and there seems to be a reluctance for the United States now to get involved in saving a democracy. Whatever one thinks of Mr. Aristide, some of us do not like some of the things the President does, or we are talking about the Vice President tonight, but we are going to wait until November, until there is another election. We are not even so sure about the last election. They talk about some irregularities in the Haitian election in 2000. We think there were some here, too, but we do not do anything. And I got to thinking that what if there was some oil in Haiti? Maybe there would be a little more interest on the part of the United States in really doing something.”