Political Quotes

“I have some photographs here that have become all too familiar to the Senate. This is a photograph of a young boy, a victim of a landmine. You can see from the photograph, he has one badly injured leg, another leg that has been torn off, and an arm that is also missing. These are similar to photographs I have on my Web page in my office on the Internet. Thousands of people turn to that Web page, and what they see there are these photographs of landmine victims. Here is one that they turn to, this young woman. I have had somebody tell me that as the picture comes down on the computer screen, the page ends at the bottom of her long skirt. Then they click on further and the picture continues down and they realize she has only one leg. This woman is from Laos. She lost her leg from a landmine. Mr. President, these photographs are not unusual. Each one represents a tragedy, of course, not only for the person involved, but also but for his or her family. These are only two victims. There are hundreds of thousands of victims of antipersonnel landmines alive today, and of course as many more who died. They are the victims of these tiny, hidden explosives that litter whole countries. They are scattered like seed. They are a blight on our planet, and they must be stopped. This mine I am holding in my hand cost $2 or $3, and is made almost entirely of plastic to make it harder to detect. These are not weapons that know the difference between a combatant or civilian.”