Political Quotes

“I thank the gentleman. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of my bill, H.R. 5317. This is the designation of the Department of Veterans Affairs healthcare center in Center Township, Butler County, Pennsylvania, as the Abie Abraham VA Clinic, as amended, and I urge its adoption. I never called him ``Abie.'' I always called him ``Sergeant'' or ``Mr. Abraham.'' I knew him, and he was not a very big man. If you were to see him, his stature, he was, probably, 5 feet, 5 inches or 5 feet, 6 inches. When I met him, it was a little bit later in life, and he never, ever bragged about his service. He never talked about it. I just knew him as a guy who lived in my hometown, as a guy who was a veteran, as a guy who was a prisoner of war; but then things started to unfold about what Mr. Abraham had endured. Now, I want you to think about this. Once the Japanese attacked the Philippines and were able to take the peninsula at Bataan, Mr. Abraham survived the Bataan Death March. That was 6 days and 7 nights of endless marching without food, without water, without any type of medical care. He had been 3\1/2\ years interned in a Japanese prison camp. You heard what the doctor said and what Ms. Brown said. This guy went through incredible pain and suffering to get there, but for as long as I knew him, he never bragged about it. He never said, ``This is what I did.'' I never knew until he wrote the book about the ghost of Bataan. I sat down with him one night, and I said: Mr.…”