Providing for Consideration of Senate Amendments to H.R. 4899, Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2010

Floor Speech

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Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman from Massachusetts for yielding.

I rise today in support of the rule and in support of the Lee amendment to responsibly end the war in Afghanistan. There is a real terrorist threat to our country, but that threat does not emanate from Afghanistan. It emanates from al Qaeda, a stateless menace, a menace that will organize and set up wherever we are not.

The ongoing and indefinite occupation in Afghanistan is not a constructive step towards the battle against a terrorist threat to this country. In fact, through the civilian casualties, we only increase the pool of potential terrorists every day that we continue this occupation.

I strongly support this concept of allowing our funds only to be used for the orderly withdrawal of American troops from the country of Afghanistan.

The mission, the challenge we have put before our men and women, is nearly a difficult and impossible challenge: To try to build a cohesive nation state out of a tribal nation, out of dealing with people in our own employ who are of dubious moral character and continue to engage in the opium and drug trade to finance their related activities.

There is a difference between the ongoing battles and insurgency in Afghanistan and the terrorist threat to this Nation. We should spare no expense in going after terrorists wherever they are, engaging in aggressive intelligence-gathering operations and taking out the ability of terrorists to train. But the ongoing occupation of Afghanistan is not a constructive step to that end.

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Mr. POLIS. I rise today in support of the rule and in opposition to the Obey amendment.

Funding for teachers and for education is my top priority here as a Member of Congress. I am a cosponsor of a bill to provide $23 billion in funding for teachers. It breaks my heart that we're only talking about $10 billion today. But what is critical to achieve success--to find $10 billion, to find $23 billion--is keeping those who advocate resources on the same page as those who advocate reform. Resources and reform. That is the promise of the Obama administration. That is the platform that I ran on. That is what will transform millions of American lives to help break the vicious cycle of poverty that holds too many families as slaves and replace it with the virtuous cycle of opportunity and hope. Programs like Race to the Top, programs like funding innovative new charter schools, programs like innovative ways to fund teacher salaries. These are the programs that are being cut by this proposed amendment.

I hope that the Secretary continues to work with us here in Congress to find ways to pay for teachers' salaries, but we need to do so in a way that doesn't have the threat of a Presidential veto and can garner strong support in this body.

Funding teacher salaries is my top priority, and I would vote for anything to do that. I don't feel that going after the reform aspects of the President's education budget is a constructive way to build a majority to be able to fund teacher salaries. So I hope that we will continue that important work. And I personally will be voting against the Obey amendment.

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