Political Quotes

“I'll yield myself another minute. Now, it should be said in the context of an appropriations bill how expensive it is to keep Guantanamo open. We're currently spending $1.6 million per detainee, compared to $34,000 per inmate at a high-security Federal prison here in the United States. And in the defense authorization we just provided another $260 million in operations costs and another $186 million for construction to continue this temporary facility, almost half a billion dollars. This does not make sense. And now we've got the hunger strikes because people see no future ahead of them. They're afraid that they'll be jailed indefinitely for charges that they can't even defend because they haven't been given the opportunity. That's not who we are as a Nation. We're a Nation of law. We're a Nation of respect for human life. But to hold these detainees and, in some cases, 46 of them are being tube-fed, strapped down for hours while a tube is inserted down their nose, that's not what we do. So let's stop it. Let's close down Guantanamo and do the right thing. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.”