Joe Cunningham: “this body should be proud. The California delegation, Republicans, Democrats, united. There were no party lines. There…”

“this body should be proud. The California delegation, Republicans, Democrats, united. There were no party lines. There were no district lines in California. Members whose districts were not even affected called to help and offered concern. The day before yesterday, the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Davis), the gentleman from California (Mr. Hunter), the gentleman from California (Mr. Issa), and myself went through 10 town hall meetings with FEMA, Red Cross, SPA and other government agencies. We witnessed in some cases firefighters who had fought fires, saving other people's homes while their own homes burned down. I witnessed people at each of these emergency centers that had actually lost their homes, and they were volunteering at those centers to help other people that had lost their homes and things. The events of 9-11 showed that people do come together, and it did so in the State of California also. In Lake Wolford we saw the sight of a young girl, her brother was driving a car, overcome by smoke, crashed the car and she died a horrible death in front of the firefighters that could not get to her to save her life. We honor our firefighters. We lost 23 firefighters in 2003. We lost a firefighter, Steven Rucker, in this fight. Captain Doug McDonald its fighting for his life with over 18 percent of his body burned. If you really want to help our firefighters, if you really want to pay them homage, there are some things we can do.…”