Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 3 minutes. I wanted to take this moment while we have a little extra time on this one to talk about Afghanistan and to express our opinions since we weren't able to get our amendment ruled in order. It's important for all the Members on the floor to understand that the base bill has language on Afghanistan, and the base bill calls for us keeping 68,000 troops in Afghanistan until the end of 2014 and then makes unspecified requests to make sure that we have sufficient troops to accomplish a series of missions after 2014. It very aggressively calls for a large troop presence in Afghanistan for an extended period of time. I, and many Members on this side of the aisle as well as some on the other, oppose that. We do not think that keeping that many troops in Afghanistan for that long is in the best interest of our national security or our country, and the bulk of the country agrees with us on that. Unfortunately, we weren't offered the opportunity to offer our amendment that offers what I think is a better approach. I am also going to reluctantly oppose Representative Lee's amendment, the only alternative we were given, which is to pull us out as fast as we safely and responsibly can. Representative Lee's amendment does not allow us to maintain any sort of counterterrorism mission, which I do think is critically important.…”