Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I would like to claim my 2 minutes, and then I will yield to my colleague.

First of all, let me just say that this is a very important resolution. I don't think many people in America really understand or remember all of the horrible things that occurred during the slave trading that took place in the past.

There is a movie out right now that talks about the slave trade and how horrible it was. It is called ``Amazing Grace.'' And I don't tout movies very much, but I would submit to all of my colleagues they ought to go see that movie. It is about William Wilberforce, who has been a hero of mine for a long time since I was a State legislator, and he led the fight in England to abolish slave trading; and it took him, I think, 18 years to get it done. But he was a real crusader for the rights of man and for the ending of slave trading.

So I would say to my colleague, Ms. Lee, I think this is a great bill you introduced. I whole heartedly support it, and I hope everybody in this House will. And as I said before, we ought to remember the horrible fight, the great fight that took place in ending slavery in England and in subsequent years.

So this is a great resolution. I really appreciate your bringing it forward.

And I hope everybody will remember William Wilberforce and the fight he made to end slavery and slave trading in England.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I might consume.

First of all, I want to congratulate Representative Solis for introducing this bill. She and I have worked together on it, and I really appreciate her hard work. She is really concerned about the rights of women around the world and not just Guatemala. I appreciate that.

Let me start out by saying today we have heard a great deal about human rights violation, slavery and other issues. The problem is not confined just to one part of the world. In China today, as Representative Smith of New Jersey has pointed out many times, there are as many as 10 million people suffering in communist gulags, and other parts of the world. In the Sudan,

we see the oppression and the horrible atrocities that are taking place and the mistreatment of not only men and women but children as well. It's just a horrible thing that we see these kinds of atrocities taking place around the world.

I really appreciate my colleagues on both sides of the aisle working so hard to focus attention on what's going on in these various areas to try to bring them to a halt. For humanity's sake, we can do no less.

I, however, today, rise in support of H. Res. 100, which recognizes and honors the women and girls who have been murdered in Guatemala. This bill brings to light the problem women in the democratic nation of Guatemala face in their daily struggle for survival. Given the current environment in Guatemala, women are not safe to walk along the streets day or night. A simple walk from home or school or work to mean abduction, mutilation or death for a Guatemalan woman or girl. Given the lack of legislative protection and judicial investigation, women are often subjected to domestic abuse, often leading to death within the home as well.

Given that there is nowhere for these victims or their families to turn, over 2,000, as has been said to my colleague, over 2,000 Guatemalan women and girls have suffered horrendous deaths in the past 5 years. Tremendous efforts have been taken by some Guatemalan legislators and human rights workers and families of the victims. They come here to Washington to try to end such atrocities by focusing attention on them.

There has been a continuous rise, however, in the brutal female deaths. There can be no rest of the weary as long as these things go on. We must come together to assist their effort and urge the government of Guatemala to take quick deliberative action to investigate the killings and prosecute those responsible and eliminate the tolerance, the tolerance of violence against women.

The women in Guatemala deserve to experience peace and prosperity within their nation and not constant fear of sexual assault and deadly mutilation, in just walking to and from work, as I said before.

I ask my colleagues to see the urgency of this bill, and to support it. Once again, Representative Solis, thanks for your hard work.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith) and ask unanimous consent that he be allowed to manage the time on this side.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

First of all, I want to congratulate Mr. Baca, my good buddy, for sponsoring this resolution. And I want to say very briefly that our side supports moving forward with this resolution of the gentleman from California, which recognizes the historical significance of Cinco de Mayo.

Our good neighbors to the south, Mexico, and we here in the U.S.A. have many things and values in common, and we ought to celebrate and share them together, as this resolution does today. Cinco de Mayo is an important holiday celebrated to commemorate May 5, 1862, the date Mexicans fought the Battle of Puebla to end their struggle for independence and freedom.

So let us recognize the historic struggle for independence and freedom of the Mexican people as symbolized by this important holiday and celebrate and rejoice together the holiday of Cinco de Mayo.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I rise tonight to congratulate two outstanding young Hoosiers, Evan Appleman and James Kennedy, for being named Indiana's top honorees in the 2007 Prudential Spirit of Community Awards program; an honor conferred on only one high school student and one middle-level student in each State annual.

Evan Appleman, 18, of Indianapolis, is a senior at Lawrence North High School. Inspired by one of his teachers who once told him that ``. . . the greatest problem people have is that they don't understand each other, not out of spite, but often out of ignorance,'' Evan took it upon himself to produce a series of bilingual television programs for a local cable TV channel as a way to promote greater understanding of the growing Hispanic community in Indianapolis; and to ``bridge the gap'' between the city's Hispanic and non-Hispanic cultures. The community's reaction has been overwhelmingly positive with many people even commenting that they previously ``had no idea so much was going on in the community.''

James Kennedy, 12, also of Indianapolis, is a sixth-grader at Creekside Middle School. Born with cerebral palsy, James became involved through his own doctor, Dr. Chuck Dietzen, with the Timmy Foundation; an organization which supports health and education initiatives in developing countries. James' work with the Foundation inspired him to do more than just raise money for a worthy cause. He began speaking at schools and other places about the importance of focusing on what people can do, not what they can't do; about what it's like to have a disability; and about the important work being done by the Timmy Foundation. In addition, James agreed to serve as a ``volunteer patient'' to help students at the University of Indianapolis learn more about cerebral palsy. I think James myself summed up best why he does what he does. He said, ``I feel what I do is important because it helps people understand that even though I wear braces on my legs and use a walker at school, I am just like any other kid with the same feelings and dreams.''

I applaud Mr. Appleman and Mr. Kennedy for their willingness to get involved and make their communities better places to live, and for the positive impact I know they have had on the lives of others, both young and old. I also commend the other young people from Indiana who were named Distinguished Finalists for their outstanding volunteer service. They are Sarah Boesing, 17, of New Albany; Kacie Giles, 18, of Lebanon; Savannah Holderman, 17, of Mishawaka; Alison Mansfield, 12, of Fort Wayne; Brittany Oliver, 17, of Lafayette; and, Cory Sprunger, 18, of Berne.

Madam Speaker, the Prudential Spirit of Community Award, was originally created by Prudential Financial in partnership with the National Association of Secondary School Principals in 1995 to impress upon all youth volunteers that their contributions to their communities are critically important and highly valued, and to inspire other young people to follow their example. I believe that young volunteers, like Evan and James, Sarah, Kacie, Savannah, Alison, Brittany and Cory truly embody what the Spirit of Community Award is all about. Their actions show that young Americans can--and do--play important roles in our communities, and that America's community spirit continues to hold tremendous promise for the future. I am proud to represent them in the U.S. House of Representatives, and I look forward to seeing what they accomplish in the future.

I ask my colleagues to join me now in recognizing and honoring all of these outstanding young women and men.

Mr. Speaker, on 9/11, 2001, two planes flew into the World Trade Center and killed over 3,000 Americans, the worst attack on America in the history of this country, worse than Pearl Harbor. The people who are behind it were al Qaeda, and Osama bin Laden said numerous times he wanted to destroy America. They are the mortal enemy of the United States of America.

General Petraeus today, when he talked to the Members of Congress, said numerous times that they were fighting al Qaeda, al Qaeda, al Qaeda in Iraq, the mortal enemy of the United States of America.

Now my colleagues on the other side of the aisle want to pull us out of there. And if they do succeed, then I believe that that will become a gathering point for all of the al Qaeda operatives and other fellow travelers in the world, and they will try to attack the United States in numerous ways, probably on our home soil again. They attacked the USS Cole, our embassies in Africa, they attacked housing in Saudi Arabia.

I just want to say to my colleagues, remember what you are doing. If you force us out of Iraq now, you are helping al Qaeda. You are helping al Qaeda set up a base of operation, and they will be able to attack the United States of America again.

I will be happy to yield to my colleague.

Let me just say that appeasement and weakness led to World War II, and 62 million people died. We are now in the nuclear age, and we have an enemy that will tie a nuclear weapon or plastic explosives around themselves and blow themselves up. If they come to America with a nuclear device, a suitcase nuclear device, they could destroy this place and kill all of us three blocks away from here by detonating that kind of a device.

Remember, they are our mortal enemy. Osama bin Laden said it. They are in Iraq. We have got to stand firm.

Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

Mr. Speaker, I am really distressed after listening to all the debate today. I have not seen this House split like this in the 25 years that I have been here, and I am really concerned not only about the future of Iraq and our troops over there, but I am concerned about the future of this country.

After 9/11, we were told by the President that this was going to be a long, arduous war against al Qaeda and that we had to go after terrorists around the world, wherever they are. Al Qaeda has attacked the USS Cole, as has been mentioned. It has attacked our embassies in Africa. It has attacked our residences in Saudi Arabia. It has attacked in Britain. It has attacked in France. It has attacked in Spain. They are not going to go away.

Al Qaeda, according to General Petraeus today, he mentioned them about five or six times, is one of the major adversaries that we face today. In fact, the new military leader, or war leader, this is the successor to al-Zarqawi, who was killed in 2006, a member of al Qaeda, is al-Muhajer, an al Qaeda leader who is now the head of the military wing of al Qaeda and the terrorist movement in Iraq. They have stated that they want to create an Islamic state and they are hell-bent to do it.

Al Qaeda, they are the ones that attacked the World Trade Center and killed 3,000 Americans. They are the ones that flew the plane into the Pentagon. They are the ones that attacked the plane and it flew into the ground in Pennsylvania, al Qaeda.

And they are the ones that apparently, according to the majority, are going to drive us out of Iraq, and if they do, my concern is that that will be a breeding ground and a launching pad for terrorism not only in the Middle East but around the world. I really have a concern about that, and if that happens, I think that what will happen is we will be involved in a much, much bigger war down the road.

We may be, if we pull out of Iraq, and I have no doubt that the opposition is going to push like the dickens to get it done, if we pull out of Iraq before the job is done, and I have sympathy for our troops and their families and everybody else, but if we pull out of Iraq before the job is done, I think we may very well be sowing the seeds for World War III. And as I have said on this floor a number of times and have talked to my colleagues, appeasement and weakness leads to horrible things.

Lord Chamberlain, going to Munich and talking to Hitler and appeasing him, led to 62 million people dying in World War II. We are now in a nuclear age. We have people who will blow themselves up in order to get their aims. They do not want to live. They want to die. They want to be martyrs.

Can you imagine what will happen if Iran develops a nuclear program and they have briefcase nuclear weapons? They will blow themselves up with a nuclear weapon. As I said earlier today, two blocks from here they could ignite one of those bombs, and it would kill all of us. They could do it two or three blocks from the White House, and it will destroy completely an eight-square-block area and radioactive fallout will be all over the place, killing tens of thousands of others.

I am really worried, and I hope my colleagues will think long and hard about not only today or yesterday, but the future. If we don't deal with this problem correctly now, if we don't let al Qaeda know that they can't win, then I believe the problems down the road are going to be much more severe, and thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, and maybe millions of people will die as a result of the wrong decision we are making right now.

Mr. Speaker, I want to start off by commenting on the lady's speech that was just made. I understand her position. War is hell. It is a horrible thing. We have been out to Bethesda and Walter Reed Hospital, and we have seen the damage that war has done to a lot of our young people.

It is a terrible thing. It was a terrible thing in all the other conflicts we have been involved in where people have been killed and maimed, World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam, the Revolutionary War, the Civil War. War is horrible. Nobody wants war. We all want our troops home as quickly as possible. There is no question about that. Where we differ is what this war is all about and what will happen if we do not do what is necessary.

Yesterday, a Sunni insurgent coalition in Iraq announced an Islamic cabinet, and they named an al Qaeda leader as their Minister of War. Throughout this whole debate over these years, the opponents on the other side have said al Qaeda was not involved in Iraq, that we did not have any reason to go in there. Al Qaeda was involved in Iraq. Osama bin Laden was involved in Iraq. The people that bombed the USS Cole, the World Trade Center, our embassies around the world were in Iraq, and now they have appointed a war minister over there who is the head of al Qaeda in Iraq today.

So there is a world war against terrorism. Al Qaeda is the main leader of that war against the United States and the rest of the world. It is a war that we cannot afford to lose. They are using children as bombs. They are taking carloads of dynamite and other explosives and are driving into crowded places to kill people.

We all know how horrible that is, and we also know how horrible it was when al Qaeda operatives flew into the World Trade Center and killed over 3,000 people, the worst tragedy in American history, and it was on our soil. So we are in a world war against radicals, al Qaeda, and we cannot back down.

If we back down in Iraq, as my colleagues on the other side want us to do, it is going to send a signal, already is sending a signal to them, the al Qaeda and the terrorists, that we will not persevere, that we will back down, and they will, as they said yesterday, create an Islamic State in Iraq. And if you create an Islamic State in Iraq and do away with the democracy that is there now, you are going to provide a breeding ground for more terrorism and more attacks on the West and Europe and the rest of the world.

This is a war that may go on for a while, but it is one we must not and cannot lose. My colleagues on the other side are well-intentioned, but the fact of the matter is they want to encourage and they are encouraging by their factions, our enemy, our mortal enemy, the terrorists and al Qaeda.

Now, yesterday, I was very distressed when the majority leader in the United States Senate said that we have lost the war. To say that when al Qaeda is appointing a war minister in Iraq is a

tragic mistake. It should never have been said. The man that they appointed, al-Muhajer, is a terrorist, and his goal is to destroy the United States and our allies and change the whole world to radical Islam. That is his goal. That is Osama bin Laden's goal. They are there, and they want to destroy us and we must hang tough.

The President is standing there by himself. I know his popularity is very, very low, as Lincoln's was and George Washington's was when they were losing the wars that they were involved in, but this is something that the American people have to realize is absolutely essential if we are going to survive as a Nation in the long term.

These people want to destroy us, and if we back down in Iraq, make no mistake, they will gain in strength and they will attack us again and our allies again around the world with acts of terrorism. They will be coming out from under the doors like cockroaches, and it is going to be hard to stop them. My view is we either whip them there or we are going to have to fight them here.

Mr. Speaker, you know, I have listened to the debate with great interest. I listened to Mr. Murtha, for whom I have great respect, when he talked about the price being paid by our troops and what he has seen at Walter Reed and Bethesda. I would just remind him that he is not the only one that has been out there. Many of us have talked to our troops who have been wounded. War is hell, there is no question about it, but sometimes you have to fight like the dickens in order to preserve your way of life.

I would like to remind you just a little bit about history. You mentioned a revolution; that brought some things to my mind. In 1776, in the winter, four of George Washington subordinate generals went to Congress and asked them to remove him, and Mr. Lee of Virginia led the fight in Congress to have George Washington removed because he was ineffective, he could not win.

One of my ancestors was at Valley Forge with George Washington when he was 14 years old, and what I want to remind you is George Washington was not removed. They didn't listen to the Congress of the United States. They didn't let Congress change things. They left him as Commander in Chief, and as a result, he won the Revolutionary War. And we are free today, and he is the father of our country.

Now, the reason I bring this up is it wasn't right then for Congress to meddle and try to micromanage the war, and it is not right now for Congress to micromanage this war. General Petraeus is the one that ought to be making the decisions, not we in this body. Let the chief executive, the Commander in Chief, run the war, not 435 or 535 Members of Congress.

Mr. Speaker, the Democrat majority has been in control of this House now for about 4 months, and they made a lot of commitments to the American people during the campaign just passed. And I thought tonight I would give a report on the success of their agenda.

They had six bills that they said they wanted to pass in the first 100 days or first 100 hours to get moving, and I would like to go through those bills one at a time:

H.R. 1, the first bill they introduced, Implementing the 9/11 Commission Recommendations Act of 2007 is stalled.

The Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007 is stalled.

The Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act of 2007, stalled.

H.R. 4, the Medicare Prescription Drug Price Negotiation Act of 2007, stalled.

H.R. 5, the College Student Relief Act of 2007, stalled.

And the CLEAN Energy Act of 2007, still stalled.

They have control of both Houses of the Congress, and these bills have not yet reached the President's desk, although they pledged to get these things done as quickly as possible after the election.

They have passed only 17 bills into law. Ten of those bills named Federal post offices and Federal buildings. None of the legislative impact on fighting the war against Islamic extremists, balancing the Federal budget, creating jobs, cutting pork barrel spending, or saving Social Security have been addressed or passed.

They have passed a budget. And the budget that they passed assumes that the President's tax cuts, which we passed early in the Bush administration that led to our economic recovery and low interest rates and low unemployment and low inflation, they want to do away with those tax cuts. And that, in effect, will amount to a $392.5 billion additional tax burden on the American people.

The Democrats' budget also includes an immediate $24 billion increase in nondefense, nonsecurity spending above the President's request. This is on top of the $23 billion of unrequested spending in the supplemental and $6 billion in the omnibus spending bill.

In addition, the Democrat budget includes 12 reserve funds, promising more than $115 billion in higher spending, which, if offset as required by the House rules, would almost surely mean another $115 billion in higher taxes. This would be on top of the $392.5 billion in tax increases they have already built into their revenue numbers.

The average taxpayer in Indiana, if this budget were to pass, would be saddled with $2,729 in additional taxes and more than 2.3 million Hoosiers would be affected just this year under the Democrat budget.

Now, I want to talk a little bit about the Democrat Iraq supplemental. That was for the defense of this country and for supplementing our troops and giving them the equipment and the support that they need to fight the war in Iraq and to fight around the world in places like the Balkans and in Afghanistan. The Democrat supplemental legislates defeat and funds favors at the troops' expense.

Let me just tell you what is in this bill. It is supposed to be for our troops and for the defense of the Nation. But in that bill they have added $120 million for the shrimp industry, which has nothing to do with defense; $74 million to store peanuts, which has nothing to do with defense; $25 million for growing spinach, which has nothing to do with defense; and $5 million for ``aquaculture,'' or to put it in a less fancy term, it is tropical fish. Five million dollars for research on tropical fish. These are things that shouldn't be in the defense supplemental, and yet my colleagues on the other side of the aisle put them in that bill.

I think the American people need to know that while they made these commitments during the campaign, they have not fulfilled those commitments. And this is a report card on the first 4 months of their reign in this House. I will try to, in every 3- or 4-month period, give another report on the progress of the Democrats' agenda, and I hope it is a lot better than this one has been.

Mr. Speaker, I was just informed by my good friend, Mr. Visclosky, that one of our former colleagues, Jim Jontz, died last Saturday. He was a Member of the other party, but he was a very fine man. He had been a State senator and a leader in Indiana for a long, long time.

We want to wish his mother and his family condolences, because he was one of the nice guys from Indiana.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Visclosky).

Mr. Speaker, I have high regard for everybody in this whole body, but when someone does something wrong, it is imperative that it be brought to light, and brought to light in a public forum.

About a week ago, the Speaker of the House, along with others, took a trip that the State Department and the White House disapproved of, to visit Syria. Syria is a terrorist state, has been on the terrorist state list for a long, long time. They have been working with Iran, they have been a transit point for weapons that went into Lebanon, weapons that killed a lot of people. They support Hezbollah and Hamas, two terrorist organizations. They work closely with Iran which has been involved in terrorism and is also on the terrorist list. And for the Speaker and others to go over there and talk with Assad, in my opinion and in the opinion of the law, the Logan Act, that it was not only the wrong thing to do and sent the wrong message, but it was a violation of an act of Congress.

I want to read to you the language in the Logan Act. It says, ``Any citizen of the United States, wherever he or she may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 3 years or both.''

Now, I am not under any illusions that there is going to be any censorship of the Speaker or any prosecution of the Speaker, but I think the American people ought to know that she weakened the position of the United States in the Middle East, and she broke the law; and she should be held accountable for that. And tonight I hope the American people get this message and send a message to the Speaker.

She has talked recently, as I understand it, and she is thinking about going to Iran and talking to Ahmadinejad. He is one of the terrorist leaders of the world. And if she were to go over there while he is building nuclear weapons and the whole world is trying to get him to stop, it would be a sure sign of weakness on the part of the United States, and it would send such a signal that they would be more aggressive than they have been in the past.

In 1938 and 1939, Winston Churchill was looked upon as a warmonger because he warned about Hitler, and yet Lord Chamberlain went to Munich, Germany, and he signed a peace agreement on Hitler's terms, gave Hitler the Sudetenland, came back, and said, ``Peace in our time,'' because he went and talked with Hitler and he thought he could convince him not to be aggressive. That was the green light for World War II and 62 million people died.

Talking to these terrorists without getting them to discuss and want to change and move away from their policies of mass destruction is wrong. Iran is trying to build nuclear weapons and they will already have one; they are trying to build a delivery system for intercontinental, intermediate range, and short-range missiles.

We must not send a signal of weakness. I think the Speaker did the wrong thing. I believe she violated the Logan Act because she didn't have the approval of both the White House and the Defense Department, and I hope that she won't do this again. And I certainly hope she won't go to Iran.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Chairman, if America is watching this debate, I'm sure they are getting confused by all this minutia, which is very, very important. So the things that they really need to be listening to tonight is, and I hope America is paying attention to this, this is the largest tax increase in the history of the United States by the people who said they weren't going to do it when they were running for office. They promised a streamlined government. They promised less spending and lower taxes.

Let me tell you what they are going to raise, and I hope everybody in America is listening because this isn't minutia, this is the facts. Marginal tax rates are going up by $192 billion. The reduction in child credit, if you've got a child, the reduction in child credit is $27 billion. That's an increase. The increase in the marriage penalty is $13 billion, you know, the marriage issue that has been around for a long time.

The death tax. If you are going to leave your business to your kids, if you want to reduce that so that you can leave your children your farm or something, they are going to increase that by $91 billion. They are going to increase the capital gains tax. If you are a small businessman trying to make it in this very competitive society in which we live, they are going to increase the cost of capital gains by $32.5 billion, and then other tax increases by $47 billion.

So, America, if you are listening tonight, and I hope you are, it is late in the day, except in California, I guess in California it is only about 5 o'clock or a little before, but if you are listening, remember, the people who promised you a streamlined government, the Democrats, the people who promised you lower taxes and better government, the Democrats, remember, they are giving you, across the board, the largest tax increase in the history of America, $392.5 billion over 5 years.

Announcement by the Acting Chairman

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I want to thank Sue Myrick who has worked on this for such a long time, along with the gentlewoman from Wisconsin for sponsoring this bill. It really is so important for people to be screened early.

I do not think there is a family in the United States that has not been touched by some form of cancer; and if you catch it early, the life expectancy can be extended a great deal of time, and in many cases, it can be cured.

We had a personal experience in my family. In fact, I lost my first wife to cancer, and I think in part it was because there was not early detection of that cancer. So one of the things that I think is most important is that women and men get screened for various forms of cancer. There is prostate cancer in men. There is cervical cancer for women. There is ovarian cancer. There is breast cancer. There needs to be early screening.

That is one of the reasons why Darrell Issa and I cosponsored Jo- Anna's Law to make doctors and patients aware of the signs of cervical cancer very, very early so that women can be saved from terminally being ill. It is so important that they learn about these things before they get out of hand.

I cannot express enough and I think Sue will tell you this, I cannot express enough the pain that a family goes through when they find out that one of their loved ones is terminally ill and it could have been prevented if you had found out about it early enough. That is why I think this is such a great program.

I am glad this reauthorization is taking place, and I thank Sue once again for working so hard on this. I want to thank the gentlewoman from Wisconsin for working so hard on this. I thank you for yielding the time, and I would just urge anybody who is paying attention to this discussion tonight, and a lot of people are not, get detection early. Get screened early. It will save your life. It will save your family a lot of heartache if you learn about these things before it is too late.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Madam Speaker, since the United States embarked on a mission to rid the world of terrorism, many of our friends around the world have distanced themselves from America, hoping that will shield them from the wrath the terrorists will one day bring to their countries. Indonesia has done the opposite: the government of the country home to the world's largest population of Muslims has instead forged stronger ties with the United States.

Recognizing Indonesia's importance on the global stage, its government--first under Megawati Soekarnoputri, and since then, under the leadership of Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono--has worked closely with the United States to fight terrorism, and the spread of radical Islamism. This alliance has come at no small cost to the Indonesians, as terrorists have repeatedly punished Indonesia by targeting hotels, nightclubs and other tourist attractions with deadly acts of terrorism. Nevertheless, the government of Indonesia has not wavered in its commitment, and has proven itself to be a great friend to the United States.

As Indonesia has supported the United States in our Global War against Terrorism, it is important that the United States continues to support Indonesia by recognizing its sovereignty, and that it doesn't intervene into Indonesia's internal matters. The government of Indonesia has proven itself to be more than sufficiently mature and responsible to handle its own internal issues, which relate only to Indonesians, and the United States should respect its abilities. The government of Indonesia has shown America that respect, and I believe we owe it to them to do the same.