Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick: “I first want to commend Speaker Pelosi for her leadership and tenacity, for doing the right thing for America; to…”

“I first want to commend Speaker Pelosi for her leadership and tenacity, for doing the right thing for America; to Chairman Obey and Chairman Murtha for working together to bring this bill to the floor. In my 30 years of public service, this is probably one of the most difficult votes I will make, but it is the right vote. I will vote ``yes'' to support the supplemental. This war has lasted longer than World War I and World War II. More than 3,200 young men and women have lost their lives, over 30,000 amputees and the like, mental health services that we don't yet know we will have to endure from this ill-advised war. It is a good supplemental. Is it perfect? No. But it does begin to change course, to change course that this Nation needs that we begin to invest in America, to take care of our children, to bring our soldiers home. I wish we could bring them home tomorrow, but there is a process, and this bill begins that process by using the President's own benchmarks that the Iraqis would rise up and take care of their own country, their own people. This is a civil war; we ought not be in it. I ask you to vote ``yes'' on the supplemental. The Americans who live in the 13th Congressional District of Michigan want our women and men in our military home now. As a Member of Congress who has opposed the war from the very beginning, so do I.”