Political Quotes

“Because as we talk about this memo from Niger and how it got into the speech, how it got into the British dossier for the justification for the war, what is equally telling and missing in the debate is the discussion of reconstruction in Iraq. And if you go over and pull over at USAID, an agency within the State Department, the plans for Iraq's reconstruction, I would like to cite some statistics. They call for 20,000 units of housing. Yet the budget for this country only calls for 5,000 units of housing here in the United States; 13 million Iraqis, half of the population, will get universal health care. Yet not a single penny in the budget presented by the administration or passed by a Republican Congress does anything to support health care for the 42 million working uninsured in this country; 12,500 schools will be given full resources for reconstruction and books and supplies. Yet in our country, teachers have to get a tax credit because they have to take money out of their own budget, personal budget, their salary to pay for supplies. Four million kids in Iraq will be given early childhood education. In the President's budget, 58,000 kids cut from Head Start. We have a deep water port in Iraq being built from top to bottom. Yet the Corps of Engineers in this country is cut by 10 percent, their budget. I think if we look at the history, the American people are quite generous and quite supportive of our efforts and we support the notion of Iraq having a new beginning.”