Barbara Mikulski: “as I understand it, in about 5 minutes we will be voting on two amendments. One is to establish a Truman-like commission…”

“as I understand it, in about 5 minutes we will be voting on two amendments. One is to establish a Truman-like commission to see if there has been profiteering in the contracts in relation to the Iraq war. Amendment No. 1660 Madam President, there is also another amendment offered by the Senator from New York, Mrs. Clinton, on a Katrina commission recommendation. I am a cosponsor of that amendment. Prior to the vote, I would now like to make a few remarks in support of the establishment of a Katrina commission. This weekend I reflected--as I am sure the Presiding Officer did when you were with your family and maybe made it back to Alaska with constituents--that two tragedies have hit our country. One is 9/11, which we can never, ever forget. How grateful we are to the 9/11 Commission for their rigorous investigation as to what happened: what went wrong, what went right; what went wrong--the failure of communications and technology and intelligence; what went right--the bravery of people, the spirit of America. Then, also, the 9/11 Commission made concrete recommendations. In fact, they are meeting this week to issue a report card on how well we have done to implement their recommendations. Three cheers for the 9/11 Commission on what they have done and what they continue to do. All of America has been mesmerized by what has happened in the Gulf-- in New Orleans, in Louisiana, in Alabama, and, of course, in Mississippi.…”