Political Quotes

“Thank you for what you have said. John McCain was a true hero. He said the same thing to me when I first met him. I do have a question for you, which will come later, but I thought I would tell you the story of how I met John McCain. I was recently wounded. Within weeks of being able to finally sit up for the first time, I was in physical therapy, and Senator McCain came and visited us. The nurses and occupational therapists and physical therapists came running in and said ``Senator McCain, this Captain Duckworth. She is a hero, just like you'' and said to me, ``You are a hero, like Senator McCain. You were both shot down.'' Senator McCain looked at me and said in that voice of his: Didn't take no hero to fly into a missile. The good pilots don't get shot down. And I knew then and there that I really liked him because he was right: The real heroes were the buddies that carried me out of that field in Iraq. The real hero is the sergeant in the rescue bird that carried me out and has to live with the post-traumatic stress. The real heroes are all the men and women who survived and came home and need the care that they have rightfully earned, the care that we are providing for them with the PACT Act, a bill that you supported, a bill that you spoke up for, even while Members, our colleagues across the aisle, many of them, said it was too expensive.…”