John Kline: “we have had several important events occur in the last weeks and days, and today of course we passed a very historic…”

“we have had several important events occur in the last weeks and days, and today of course we passed a very historic piece of legislation in the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act to make sure that our country is safer, that our troops have what they need for this war on terror. All of this prompted me to think that it was time to sort of recap where we are, where we have been, where we are, and where we are going in this war against the Islamic extremists who attacked us so horrifically and so viciously on September 11. We also have coming up tomorrow Military Spouse Appreciation Day, and that certainly is one of those events that the timing of which has come together to make me want to come to the floor and discuss with my colleagues our progress in this war on terror. I hope to be joined by some more of my colleagues here in a minute. We had a little bit of scrambling to get the timing right. The early vote today had people out of pocket, as we used to say. Let me start by just recapping some of the really, really big events that we have seen happen in the last few months. I have a picture here next to me that I think is absolutely astonishing in its implication. These are women in Afghanistan who are serving now as police officers in the Afghani security forces. Just think about that.…”