Byron Dorgan: “I am struck by the letter put on our desks signed by former Secretaries of State that talk about the nongovernmental…”

“I am struck by the letter put on our desks signed by former Secretaries of State that talk about the nongovernmental character of NED, how relevant the nongovernmental character of NED is. The governmental character of NED is this is all Government money, it is all the taxpayers' money, divided up four ways: Give some to the Republicans, some to the Democrats, some to the Chamber of Commerce, some to the AFL-CIO and say, ``Go do some nice things in support of democracy.'' The problem is it duplicates what we are doing in half a dozen other programs in the State Department. In the last election, Republicans won, and I applaud them for that. The score was 20 percent of the American people voted Republican; roughly 19 percent of the American people voted Democrat; and 51 percent of the American people said, ``Count me out, it doesn't matter, I'm not going to vote at all.'' It may be that we ought to talk about promoting a little democracy in this country. This is not all that much money, but it is enough, and it is one of those programs that simply will not quit. It does not matter that it cannot be justified.”