Patty Murray: “as we wind up the debate, it would be easy for me to stand here on the floor of the Senate--after months of saying we…”

“as we wind up the debate, it would be easy for me to stand here on the floor of the Senate--after months of saying we need to address this issue, we need an emergency supplemental and we are finally here--to say I told you so. But that is not how I feel right now. What I am thinking about at this point is my own father, who was a veteran of World War II, one of the first soldiers into Okinawa, who was injured, sent to Hawaii, was in the hospital there for 3 months, and he went back to serve in Okinawa again and then was in a wheelchair for most of my life before he passed away. I am thinking of the men and women in the veterans' hospital in Seattle WA, back in 1972 when I was a senior in college and I volunteered at the veterans' hospital there during the Vietnam war, working on the psychiatric ward with young men and women my age who were returning from Vietnam and understanding what they were going through, and then going back onto the street and the public not aware of the sacrifice of these soldiers. I am thinking of the young men and women I recently met in Iraq serving us today, who were asking us: Will my country be there for me? I can assure you none of those soldiers were saying: Will the Republicans be there for me? Will the Democrats be there for me? They were asking: Will we, as Americans, be there for them?…”