Thomas Mott Osborne: “as we have listened to debates over the last several days, actually last several weeks, there has been a lot of rhetoric…”

“as we have listened to debates over the last several days, actually last several weeks, there has been a lot of rhetoric about how poorly things are going in Afghanistan and Iraq, the administration has no plan, et cetera, and along with many other Members of Congress, I visited both countries within about the last 5 or 6 weeks, and it did not seem to me that the information I was getting and seeing squared with what we have been hearing. In Afghanistan, for instance, the Taliban is out. They were a tremendously oppressive regime. Terrorist training camps, and of course, Afghanistan was the hotbed of terrorist activity, have been shut down. Most of the funding has been dried up. Al Qaeda is on the defense, and of course, the democratic loyal jurga formed a constitution which I think was a tremendous step toward democracy. Women have been given a significant role. Elections have been scheduled this summer, and they have a great leader in Karzai, and I think there is a great chance he will be elected President. All of this has been accomplished with 13,000 coalition troops controlling this country, very little loss of life. It has been a tremendous military victory and a great victory for those who are opponents of terrorism.”