Political Quotes

“we are at the end of a 6-week process, and I am proud of the work that the House has accomplished. We cannot afford to fail in Iraq. The best and brightest in this House have scrubbed the proposal sent from the White House. We have done our best work, and now it is time to vote. Those who say this is a blank check from the White House are just not telling it like it is. This is a world changing paradigm shift on the other side of the world. I think back to the bipartisan retreat early this year. I was there. Thomas Friedman came from the New York Times, spoke to a large group and said, maybe we are not going about this right, but we need to do this. He really said this needs to happen, an experiment in the 22 Arab countries to promote democracy and make this investment. We were all hit with sticker shock. Eighty-seven billion dollars is a huge number. It shocked me but we now realize how important it is. It is going to be incalculable the benefits of this investment. The big debate came down to loans versus grants. When I looked the President eye to eye, he said we believe we are going to get U.N. support. We did, unanimous, for a U.S.-led peacekeeping force in Iraq. We are making progress. Frankly, I was disappointed with Madrid. I say to the White House tonight, prove us wrong on the loans; work until we get more global support. I believe we need to. The bottom line is this is an unprecedented situation in the history of the world, and we have got to step up.”