Making Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Motion to Proceed

Floor Speech

MAKING EMERGENCY SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS MOTION TO PROCEED -- (Senate - November 15, 2007)

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Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, on tomorrow, we will be voting on several items. Two are going to be related to our policy on Iraq. Tonight, I wish to express my views on the choices that are before the Senate and the American people. I know later in the evening a number of colleagues will speak to this issue. I welcome the chance to now express my view.

Madam President, I oppose the minority leader's effort to provide a $70 billion blank check to President Bush for his failed Iraq policy. I will support legislation approved yesterday in the House of Representatives requiring the President to begin to bring our combat troops out of Iraq in 1 month and complete the withdrawal by December of next year. I hope the Senate will support it, and I hope President Bush will sign it into law.

Earlier this month, we reached another tragic milestone in Iraq. We have lost more Americans in Iraq this year than in any other year. It is another painful and somber reminder of the enormous price in precious lives the Iraq war continues to impose. It is long past time for the administration to change course and end the national nightmare the Iraq war has become. Our military has served nobly in Iraq and done everything we have asked them to do. But they are caught in a continuing quagmire. They are policing a civil war and implementing a policy that is not worthy of their enormous sacrifice.

The best way to protect our troops and our national security is to put the Iraqis on notice that they need to take responsibility for their future so that we can bring our troops back home to America safely. As long as our military presence in Iraq is open-ended, Iraq's leaders are unlikely to make the essential compromises for a political solution.

The administration's misguided policy has put our troops in an untenable and unwinnable situation. They are being held hostage to Iraqi politics, in which sectarian leaders are unable or unwilling to make the difficult judgments needed to lift Iraq out of its downward spiral.

BG John F. Campbell, deputy commanding general of the 1st Cavalry Division in Iraq, spoke with clarity about the shortcomings of Iraq's political leaders. He said:

The ministers, they don't get out. ..... They don't know what the hell is going on on the ground.

Army LTG Mark Fetter said that ``it is painful, very painful'' dealing with the obstructionism of Iraqi officials.

About conditions on the ground, Army MG Michael Barbero said:

..... it's not as good as it's being reported now.

All of these military deserve credit for their courage in speaking the truth. We should commend them for it. These are courageous, brave military speaking the truth.

Yet the President continues to promise that success is just around the corner. He continues to hold out hope that Iraq's leaders are willing and capable of making essential political compromises necessary for reconciliation.

The American people know we are spending hundreds of billions of dollars on a failed policy that is making America more vulnerable and putting our troops at greater risk. The toll is devastating. Nearly 4,000 American troops have died, tens of thousands of Iraqis have been killed or injured, and over 4 million more have been forced to flee their homes. Nearly a half trillion dollars has been spent fighting this war.

It is wrong for Congress to write a blank check to the President for this war. It is obvious that President Bush wants to drag this process out month after month so he can hand off his policy to the next President. It is time to put the brakes on this madness. It is up to us to halt the open-ended commitment of our troops that President Bush has been making year after year. We need to tell the Iraqis now that we intend to leave and leave soon. Only by doing so can we create the urgency that is so clearly necessary for them to end their differences.

We cannot allow the President to drag this process out any longer. This war is his responsibility, and it is his responsibility to do all he can to end it.

It is wrong for him to pass the buck to his successor when he knows thousands more of the courageous members of the Armed Forces will be wounded or die because of it. Every day this misguided war goes on, our service men and women and their families continue to shoulder the burden and pay the price.

If this issue were only about the tragedies of the war, there would be reason enough to end it. But it has become about so much more. Now we are also starting to see the fallout at home as the President refuses to deliver the relief our families need.

Earlier this week, the President signed a Defense appropriations bill that includes a 10-percent increase in funding compared to last year, but he vetoed a bill that includes an increase half that big that would fund cancer research, investments in our schools, job training, and protection for our workers. That bill included $4.5 billion more than the President proposed for education. He said that $4.5 billion more for students is too much. Yet he has asked for 35 times that much more for the war in Iraq. He wants us to say yes to $158 billion for Iraq when he says no to $4.5 billion for American children.

In Iraq, anything goes. The sky is the limit. Billions and billions of dollars for Iraq. But here in America, right here at home, a modest investment in our school children gets a veto.

The bill included $3 billion to improve the quality of our teachers. Those funds would have been used to hire 30,000 more teachers, provide high-quality induction and mentoring for 100,000 beginning teachers, and provide high-quality professional development for an additional 200,000 teachers. One week of the failed policy in Iraq is the cost. We could do all of this for our teachers for the cost of a single week in Iraq, but the President says no.

The bill that he vetoed included $7 billion to provide high-quality early education through Head Start. Yesterday, the Senate approved a Head Start bill to strengthen the program and make Head Start even better. The bill goes a long way in strengthening the quality of the personnel, tying Head Start to kindergarten and other education programs in the States and consolidating all the various programs in the States that are available to children to make them more effective. Each of these improvements make an enormous difference in the lives of Head Start children. Funds the President vetoed would be used to build a basic foundation for learning that will help low-income and minority children for the rest of their lives. We can improve this foundation for the cost of a little more than 2 weeks in Iraq.

But even as we work in Congress to improve this vital program, the President says no. No, no, no to this program, no to the Head Start children. We are only reaching half of those who are eligible for the program at this time. We have over 4 million poor children under the age of 5 in the United States of America; we only reach 1 million of them. We all know what a difference early intervention makes for children in education. It is critically important for us to continue strengthening the academic programs, socio-emotional support, and health services delivered through Head Start and yet the President continues to say no.

The same misguided rationale applies to other investments in this bill. The President's choices cast aside urgently needed research on heart disease, diabetes, asthma, infectious disease, and mental health, and many other areas that could find cures and bring relief to millions of our fellow citizens.

This chart shows $4.9 billion in cancer research which would fund over 6,800 grants; diabetes research, pandemic flu, with all the dangers we are facing with the potential for a pandemic flu--that is necessary--support for the CDC, one of the prime health agencies to help protect Americans. It does such a good job in terms of immunizations and community health centers, which is a lifeline for 15 million of our fellow citizens, so many of whom have lost their health insurance. And the answer is no to those individuals.

It is true, in terms of American workers, the President rejects funding to enforce the labor laws that keep workers safe and to give them a level playing field. Instead, the President's veto takes bad employers off the hook and puts the safety and lives of American workers at risk. The President's choices are devastating to veterans as well. Listen to this, Mr. President. Each year nearly 320,000 brave servicemen return to civilian life, many coming from Iraq and Afghanistan. Tens of thousands--here is the chart. These are the returning veterans from Afghanistan and Iraq. Tens of thousands of reservists and National Guard have lost their benefits and even their jobs because they served their country. That is why the appropriations bill provided $228 million to help veterans find jobs, obtain training, and protect their right to return to former jobs. They are guaranteed now under existing law, but what is happening is that law is not being implemented. We found that three-quarters of returning veterans do not even know about their rights and, in many instances, they are losing their jobs, they are losing their overtime pay, and they are losing their pensions. That is why today one out of four homeless people in the United States is a former veteran. The bill we approved would help address this issue, but that was also vetoed.

The bill we will have a chance to vote on tomorrow in the Senate, which was approved by the House of Representatives yesterday, also takes an important step in reining in the Bush administration's use of torture. It is difficult to believe that in this day and age, Congress needs to legislate against the use of torture to prevent the President of the United States from abusing prisoners. Torture and cruel, inhuman, and

The Nation was shocked by the horrible images from Abu Ghraib prison, and America was shamed in the eyes of the world. The administration tried to whitewash the episode by blaming it on low-level soldiers, but the truth about our use of torture couldn't be concealed. Led by President Bush, Vice President Cheney, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, and Attorney General Gonzales, the administration had set a course that undermined fundamental American values in the craven belief that torture could somehow make us more secure.

Our interrogators were authorized to shackle prisoners in stress positions, induce hypothermia, and use sleep deprivation, extend isolation, bombardment with lights and loud music, and even now the infamous practice of waterboarding. The Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel--listen to this, Mr. President--the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel gave its approval to the legality of these practices in the morally outrageous Bybee torture memorandum. The Bybee torture memorandum was in place for more than 2 1/2 years until Mr. Gonzales appeared before the Judiciary Committee when he wanted to be the Attorney General of the United States. He could look over that committee and tell that if he had to defend that memorandum, he would never make it, and he was right.

What happened? The administration repealed the Bybee torture memorandum, and Mr. Gonzales got through the Judiciary Committee, although there were more than 40 votes in the Senate against his confirmation.

Under the Bybee memorandum, if the President approved the use of torture, no one could be prosecuted for breaking our Nation's laws or international obligations.

Do my colleagues understand? Under the Bybee memorandum, if you were going to prosecute an individual for using torture, you had to demonstrate a specific intent that the purpose of the torture in which you were involved was not to gain information but just to harm the individual. Unless a prosecutor would be able to demonstrate that the purpose of torturing an individual was not to gain information, you were effectively let off, free.

As the distinguished Dean of Yale Law School, Dr. Koh, said, it was the worst piece of legal reasoning he had seen in the history of studying laws in the United States and legal opinions.

The administration withdrew the Bybee memo in embarrassment when it became public. Indeed, the now-Attorney General Mukasey refused to denounce waterboarding as torture.

Only leaders who fail to understand the founding principles of America could approve such behavior. Our country needs to stand beyond reproach for the sanctity of each individual, for freedom, for justice, for the rule of law. But the administration turned its back on all these traditions and on the ideals of America itself.

In 2005, Congress passed the Detainee Treatment Act to ensure that all interrogations conducted by the Department of Defense would comply with the Army Field Manual, a comprehensive and effective approach to interrogation that prohibits the use of torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading techniques in favor of techniques that are most likely to be effective in gaining necessary information.

LTG John Kimmons said, when releasing the manual:

No good intelligence is going to come from abusive practices. I think history tells us that. I think the empirical evidence of the last five years, hard years, tells us that. The Manual itself tells us that the use of torture is not only illegal, but also it is a poor technique that yields unreliable results, may damage subsequent collection efforts, and can induce the source to say whatever he thinks the [interrogator] wants to hear.

Last May, General Petraeus echoed these statements in a letter to all our servicemembers in Iraq saying that ``torture and other expedient methods to obtain information'' are not only illegal and immoral, but also generally ``neither useful nor necessary.''

We now know, however, that the 2005 act left open a loophole that undermines the basic safeguards against torture and cruel and degrading treatment. We applied the field manual to the Department of Defense, but not to the CIA.

Last year in the Military Commissions Act, Congress left it to the President to define by Executive order the interrogation practices that would bind all Government interrogators, including the CIA. The President's Executive order drove a Mack truck through this small loophole. The vague terms of the order permit many of the most heinous interrogation practices.

The provisions of the bill we will have an opportunity of voting on tomorrow closed that loophole. They require that all U.S. interrogations, including those conducted by the CIA, conform to the Army Field Manual. This very simple and easily implemented reform means no more waterboarding, no more use of dogs or other extreme practices prohibited by the Manual. There will still be great flexibility in use of interrogation methods and our interrogators will be able to effectively get the required information, but torture will be off the table.

This bill is an opportunity to restate our commitment to the ideals and security of our Nation. It is an opportunity to repair the damage done to our reputation by the scandal of Abu Ghraib and the abuses of Guantanamo. It is an opportunity to restore our Nation as the beacon for human rights, fair treatment, and the rule of law. It is an opportunity to protect our brave service men and women, both in and out of uniform, from similar tactics. It is a simple but vital step in returning our Nation to the rule of law and the ideals on which America was founded, and it deserves to be enacted into law as soon as possible.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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