Waiving Requirement of Clause 6(a) of Rule XIII with Respect to Consideration of Certain Resolutions

WAIVING REQUIREMENT OF CLAUSE 6(a) OF RULE XIII WITH RESPECT TO CONSIDERATION OF CERTAIN RESOLUTIONS -- (House of Representatives - November 18, 2005)

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Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. I thank the gentleman for yielding me time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in favor of the rule and in strong opposition to the underlying resolution. Our mission in Iraq is clear: Peace through strength, victory through resolve. Those who would have us retreat immediately have forgotten what appeasement does to the Islamic extremist madmen and murderers. Our goal in Iraq is honorable and wise. We must see this through to our victorious end. The choice is that simple, yet that important.

In his 2005 speech commemorating Veterans Day, President Bush affirmed that it is courage that liberated more than 50 million people from tyranny in the last century, and it is courage that will once again destroy the enemies of freedom.

As the stepmother of a proud Marine, Douglas Lehtinen, who, together with my future daughter-in-law Lindsay, is currently serving our Nation in Iraq, and as the wife of a decorated Vietnam veteran, I have witnessed this courage and this commitment to the mission of liberty.

In one of his e-mails from Iraq, Dougie asked that I remind the American people that it was not the United States who asked for this global struggle against Islamic extremists. It was the Islamic jihadists who targeted the free world and our Nation long before we entered Iraq. We cannot afford to yield the victory to the Islamic extremists by withdrawing now.

Dougie forwarded a piece to me just yesterday by Lieutenant General James T. Conway which best summarizes the opinion of many of our troops about the need to stay the course. Conway states: ``Our soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines realize that the biggest threat to mission accomplishment depends on what their fellow Americans do. The insurgents realize full well that the only choice they have of defeating the U.S. military is to weaken the will of the American population.''

He adds, The insurgents in Iraq maim and kill the less protected Iraqis, but their real target is that portion of the American public that is shaped by the news media.

Let us heed the message from our men and women in our Armed Forces serving in Iraq. They are in the best position to assess what we need to do, and they are asking us not to pull out of Iraq at this juncture. Iraq is at one of the epicenters of the U.S. comprehensive strategy to fight terrorism worldwide.

Our ability to project major Armed Forces to the very heart of the Middle East provides the United States and our allies in the war against terrorism the ability to directly address the tactical and ideological challenges of Islamic extremists. Through the promotion of an incipient Iraqi democracy, we continue our concerted efforts to counter the root causes of Islamic extremists in the region. These radicals are fully cognizant that the emergence of a new and democratic Iraq will inevitably threaten their very survival because freedom threatens them. Democratic governments deny them the funds, the weapons, and the sanctuary that they need to survive. Democracy denies them the new recruits that they need.

As such, Mr. Speaker, we must continue to support the people of Iraq in their efforts to strengthen their emerging democracies whose pace of development has been astounding. In January, the people of Iraq turned out in droves to vote in their first free democratic elections. In October, they once again voted to approve their Constitution, and today they are busily preparing for elections in December that will continue Iraq in its transition from a brutal totalitarian state to a free democratic nation. It takes time. We will succeed.

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