Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I am here today to support the fishers and the fishers' families on the west coast whose livelihood teeters on the brink of disaster as we stand here today.

It is outrageous that it has come to this. It is outrageous that the Bush administration's botched Klamath River policies will shut down 90 percent of the commercial salmon season and take huge bites out of the recreational and tribal catches.

It is outrageous that fisheries' managers were given the task of deciding between the survival of fishers and the survival of Klamath salmon, without the means to achieve either.

It is outrageous that the Bush administration continues to punish the fishing industry by challenging the court decision that would have returned needed flows to the Klamath River area.

It is outrageous that despite a 60 percent cutback in last year's fishing season, emergency economic assistance has been denied.

And, finally, it is outrageous that without economic assistance this year, many fishermen and their boats will be down and useless for the rest of eternity.

Mr. Chairman, I spoke earlier today about the devastation befalling the salmon fisher families along the north coast. Because of gross mismanagement on the part of this administration and because of their typical disregard for sound science, this year's season has been cut by 90 percent. Ninety percent.

Imagine how your life would change if your income was cut by 90 percent. Imagine how could you pay for you your food, not including how would you pay for a boat. And it is not only the families of salmon fishers out in Oregon and California who are generation fisher families who need their livelihood, who are now talking about selling their boats. It is the entire communities who will suffer because of this inaction who depend on this industry.

The Bush administration created this disaster, and it is well past time that they own up and take some responsibility before it is entirely too late. Hundreds of families are depending on it. Please support this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, over the past months, we have all met with them. They live in our towns. They come to our offices. They come to the Hill every single year, and they come from all walks of life. They share with us their experience or the experiences of someone they loved, someone with epilepsy, glaucoma, cancer, AIDS or other chronic pain. Their stories touch our lives, and if only for a moment, we feel their misery.

But unless we are affected personally or know somebody who is affected, after a few hours, we inevitably get caught up in something else. Today, we can actually do something that might improve their lives. We can stop prosecuting the use of medical marijuana in the States that legally permit it.

The choice to use medical marijuana is mostly made out of medical necessity and the desire to get through the day with as much normalcy and strength as possible.

This is the right thing to do for those who are sick, who are in pain and those who cannot keep a meal down. Let's not be bad politicians. Let's make smart decisions. Let's help these good people.

Mr. Speaker, I rise with pride today to honor my constituent Robert A. Macpherson, recipient of the 2006 Federal Highway Administration's Excellence in Right of Way Award in the Leadership category. This biennial national award is given to one individual who has demonstrated excellence in leadership and made outstanding innovations in the field of right of way.

The prestigious award was presented to Mr. Macpherson by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials and FHWA Right of Way and Utilities. This honor recognizes Mr. Macpherson's significant contributions to his profession that have helped to streamline the process of real property acquisition, making it easier to acquire property while protecting the rights of owners and tenants.

Mr. Macpherson has been a dedicated employee of the California Department of Transportation for over 40 years. During his tenure with the department he has served the people of California in many capacities, most recently as the District 4 Deputy Director for Right of Way and Right of Way Engineering and Surveys.

In addition to his longtime service to the California Department of Transportation, Mr. Macpherson has volunteered for the Boy Scouts of America for over 25 years. He is the father of four and resides in San Rafael with his wife of 46 years.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Macpherson is a shining example of the benefits that hard working and creative individuals can contribute not only to the state of California but to the country. It is my pleasure to honor him for the receipt of the 2006 Federal Highway Administration's Excellence in Right of Way Award. I have no doubt that he will continue to serve his community as an example of effective and dedicated leadership.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to speak out of order.

Mr. Speaker, stop the presses; we found Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Or at least that is what some Members of Congress would have the American public believe. They stake this claim on an unclassified portion of an intelligence report that addressed the finding of 500 weapons shells of old, inert chemical agents from the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. The shells had been buried deep within the ground near the Iranian border and forgotten by Iraqi soldiers.

Yesterday, intelligence officials made clear that these deactivated shells were not the so-called weapons of mass destruction that the Bush administration used as the basis for going to war in Iraq. Mr. Speaker, a few weapons shells from a two-decade-old war does not a weapons of mass destruction program make.

No matter how you slice it, no matter how you package the story, Saddam Hussein simply didn't have a weapons of mass destruction program in Iraq; yet, there are those who would stop at nothing to prove they existed. It is as if finding the weapons of mass destruction would somehow validate an unjust and unnecessary war that has been mismanaged from the day it was first shamefully conceived.

Mr. Speaker, do a few weapons shells from a two-decade-old war justify the 2,511 American soldiers who have been killed in Iraq? Do they justify the more than 18,000 soldiers who have been wounded forever? How about the countless others who have been traumatized

by psychological and physical injuries or the tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians who have been killed?

Speaking of U.S. troops killed in Iraq, the President's new press secretary recently called the 2,500th American casualty ``just a number.''

But the American people know that this soldier and the other 2,510 soldiers who have been killed aren't just numbers; they are sons, they are daughters, they are husbands and wives, they are fathers, they are mothers; and each of them was willing to lay down their own life for what they believed to be their duty as part of the U.S. military.

These brave men and women deserve a foreign policy worthy of their sacrifice. Unfortunately, their civilian superiors at the Pentagon and at the White House have let them down in many ways, but particularly by referring to any troop, dead or alive, as just a number.

Instead of trying to justify a tremendously wrong-headed war by pointing to decades-old shells buried in the ground, the Bush administration ought to start engaging in a little something called diplomacy. By going on a diplomatic offensive, the United States will shift its role from that of Iraq's military occupier to its reconstruction partner. We need to engage the United Nations to oversee Iraq's economic and humanitarian needs. At the same time, we must publicly renounce any desire to control Iraqi oil and ensure that the United States does not maintain lasting military bases.

Engaging in diplomacy will give Iraq back to the Iraqi people, helping them rebuild their economic and physical infrastructure, creating Iraqi jobs, and ending the humiliation that corresponds with another country maintaining 130,000 plus occupying troops on their soil.

A strategy emphasizing the diplomacy is in line with an approach I call SMART security. SMART stands for Sensible, Multi-Lateral, American Response to Terrorism. Instead of throwing our military weight around the world, SMART security utilizes multilateral partnerships, regional security arrangements, and robust inspection programs to address the threats of weapons of mass destruction.

Mr. Speaker, to be able to address the true threats we face as a Nation, we need to retract ourselves from the very conflict that is damaging our national security on a daily basis, and there is one and only one, important way to begin this process. For the sake of our soldiers, for the sake of their families, for the sake of our very own national security, it is time to stop sacrificing lives and limbs. It is time to stop spending billions of dollars on this war, and it is time to bring our troops home.

Mr. Speaker, yesterday the House voted on the Defense appropriations bill for the year 2007, and once again, we missed a golden opportunity. We missed an opportunity to pass a bill that strengthens our national security, while at the same time, reflecting the very best of American values.

Foremost among these values is our desire for peace, our capacity for global leadership and our compassion for the people of the world.

Unfortunately, the Defense bill passed by the House, which included a $50 billion bridge fund for Iraq, came to a grand total of $431 billion. This amounts to more than all other discretionary programs combined. With this latest appropriation, the war in Iraq now totals $320 billion.

With this amount of money, we could have given more than 61 million American teenagers a 4-year university scholarship. We could have created nearly 3 million affordable housing units, a process by the way that would in itself have created over 1 million jobs.

Remember, this is the same war that Paul Wolfowitz said could be paid for out of Iraq's oil revenues, the same war that caused Bush economic adviser, Lawrence Lindsey, to be fired when he suggested it might cost as much as $200 billion.

Three years, more than $300 billion later, and over 2,500 American soldiers killed and more than 18,000 wounded, and with Iraq's oil still not flowing at the capacity it was before the war, there is still no end in this war in sight. We are still mired in a seemingly endless conflict.

The President still has not told the American people how he plans to bring our troops home, or even what an end to the war would look like. In fact, when pressed, our President, the commander-in-chief, explained that ending the war would be the job of a future President.

Mr. Speaker, this administration likes to claim that those who support the U.S. leaving Iraq are somehow not supportive of our troops, but the very, very opposite is true. Those who would leave our soldiers in harm's way for years on end on a dangerous and ill-conceived mission should ask themselves whether this is the best way to truly support our troops and to truly secure America.

What we need is a smarter approach to national security, an approach that puts sanity back in our Nation's defense policies.

With the help of Physicians for Social Responsibility, the Friends Committee on National Legislation, and Women's Action for New Direction, I have introduced a plan that would do just that. It is SMART security, H. Con. Res. 158, and it represents a sensible, multilateral, American response to terrorism.

SMART security focuses on investments in multilateral partnerships and regional security arrangements, rather than spending billions of dollars for perpetual war and Cold War relics like the missile defense system.

SMART attacks terrorism at its source with an ambitious international development agenda that supports democracy and economic growth in the troubled regions around the world.

You see, Mr. Speaker, it is time for a fundamental change in our national security policy, a change affected through our actions on the ground and through the bills we pass in Congress. Yesterday's Defense bill was a step in the opposite direction.

The first step in the right direction is an end to the war in Iraq. For the sake of our soldiers, their families and our national security, it is time to stop spending billions of dollars on this war, and it is time to bring our troops home.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to speak out of order.

Mr. Speaker, last week in his surprise visit to Baghdad, President Bush was full of happy talk. ``The progress here in Iraq has been remarkable when you really think about it,'' he said.

But as usual, with this administration, there is a side of the story you don't hear until it leaks out.

Over the weekend, the Washington Post reported on a memo under the name of U.S. Ambassador of Iraq Zalmay Khalizad, which describes the treacherous living conditions faced by Iraqi nationals who work for the U.S. Embassy.

The cable cites harassment from militia groups, hostility from security forces, the ones we have trained, sporadic utilities in 115- degree heat, scarce and expensive fuel, women forced to cover their faces in public, kidnappings of family members, fear of recrimination if it is discovered that they are employed by the embassy and are thus aiding the occupation. Some of these men and women haven't even told their families where they work.

Mr. Speaker, is this the freedom that the President says is transforming the Middle East?

The dispatch describes the central government, the one we have heard the Bush administration pump up to no end, as ineffective and ``not relevant.'' Embassy staff report that it is actually local militia and neighborhood governments that control the streets.

After 2,500 American deaths, more than a quarter of a trillion dollars spent, and our global reputation lying in tatters, we still don't have a grip on basic security in Iraq. It is absolutely scandalous.

Mr. Speaker, if the men and women who work for the U.S. Government feel threatened, how can we possibly hope to maintain peace, rule of law and basic services for millions of ordinary Iraqis living outside of the bubble of the Green Zone?

It couldn't be clearer. We are not trusted, respected or beloved in Iraq. Our military presence is not providing relief from an atmosphere of resentment, danger and paranoia in Iraq; we are contributing to it. In fact, we are exacerbating it.

There is only one answer, Mr. Speaker. It is time, in fact, it is long past time, for our troops to come home. We can help Iraqis build a more promising future. We can help them rebuild their country and do our best to help them resolve sectarian strife. But we can do it only as a partner, not as an occupier. We can do it only if we end this disastrous war, only if we return Iraq to the Iraqis and return our troops to their families.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to speak out of order.

Mr. Speaker, it has been almost 39 months since our troops were sent to Iraq; and today, more than 37 months after the President declared their mission accomplished, they are still there, still fighting a guerrilla war for which they weren't properly trained or equipped, still paying for the tragic blunders of their civilian superiors, and still risking life and limb because of a security threat that never even existed.

If American troops are still in Iraq at year's end, and, unfortunately, it appears they might be, we will have been in Iraq longer than these soldiers' grandfathers fought in World War II. The difference is that that was a much different war, with a clearer objective, a national consensus, a moral core, and a just cause.

Not only has Iraq not made us safer; it has actually harmed our national security, making the United States an international pariah, provoking the range of anti-American jihadists around the Muslim world, and stoking the fires of an insurgency that gets stronger every day, every day that we are in Iraq.

And that doesn't even take into account the staggering human cost, the 2,500th American soldier killed just yesterday, more than 1,800 soldiers gravely wounded, thousands of others mentally and physically traumatized by their combat experience, not to mention the countless tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians who died for the cause of their own so-called liberation.

Mr. Speaker, the sham resolution that the Republicans in Congress brought to the floor yesterday and that we voted on just a few minutes ago is yet another partisan divisive attempt to stay the course and to link support for this war to support for our troops.

We could have debated particulars of a military disengagement. We could have a substantive discussion that results in an actual change in the Nation's Iraq policy. Instead, we did nothing more than a little Kabuki dance that at the end of the day won't change a single thing except to prove that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are willing to distort the facts and use the war and our troops for politics.

There is nothing inconsistent about having the deepest contempt for the war, but the utmost admiration for the soldiers on the front lines. Last fall, I traveled to Iraq and visited with our troops. My conversations with them only confirmed what I already knew, that these are uniquely loyal, intelligent, and courageous Americans. They represent the very finest our country has to offer, and they deserve our unyielding gratitude every hour of every day.

If only they had civilian leaders who were worthy of their service and their sacrifice. If only the people who are running this war had half the honor, half the integrity of the men and women who are fighting it. It is because I support the troops that I have advocated so passionately for their return home. And we can do that, and we can do it without abandoning Iraq.

We must establish a multilateral security force to keep the peace in Iraq

while shifting the U.S. role from military occupier to reconstruction partner. This is what the American people want, Mr. Speaker. They want to help Iraq rebuild and become a free democratic society, but they want it done without another drop of American bloodshed. They want their sons and daughters, they want their mothers and fathers, their brothers and sisters, their friends and neighbors back home where they belong.

What we need now is action from Washington, not platitudes and photo opportunities, not inconsequential resolutions that require lawmakers to risk absolutely nothing. The American people are looking to Washington. They are begging for leadership. It is time this Congress and the President of the United States provided some.

Mr. Speaker, many of us voted against this war from the very beginning. In fact, 60 percent of the Democrats voted ``no'' to the war in Iraq. Since then, we have hosted informal hearings, we have founded the Out of Iraq Caucus, we forced a debate and vote on the House floor, Mr. Murtha offered his intelligent proposal to redeploy our troops, and last night I gave my 151st 5-minute speech on Iraq.

Mr. Speaker, it has been almost 39 months since our troops were sent to Iraq, and today, more than 37 months after the President declared ``Mission Accomplished,'' our troops are still there.

Just this week, the President of the United States said this about Iraq, and I quote: ``My message to the enemy is don't count on us leaving before we succeed. Don't bet on American politics forcing my hand, because it is not going to happen.'' Except, Mr. Speaker, it is completely unclear what constitutes success or when the mission will be accomplished under these circumstances. Saying we will stand down when the Iraqis stand up? Well, that is just talking points that give the American people no clear guide as to when they can expect this war to end.

By leaving this question vague, by defining success entirely on his own terms, the President is allowing himself an open-ended commitment and a blank check in Iraq. As for his hand being forced by American politics, what the President calls American politics is actually a majority of our citizens outraged at the loss of life, the hundreds of billions spent, and the global credibility we have squandered.

The American people, as of this morning, see 2,500 U.S. troops killed, more than 18,000 U.S. soldiers gravely wounded, and thousands more mentally and physically traumatized from their experience in the war. They see the United States losing an equivalent of one battalion every month in Iraq, and the American people want answers. They do not want partisan resolutions like the one before us today, a resolution that does nothing to end this war.

They see all the sacrifices, Mr. Speaker, and they ask, for what? They know none of it is making Americans in Iraqi safer. In fact, the presence of nearly 150,000 American troops in Iraq has become a rallying point for anti-American extremists in the Arab world. The people of this country support our troops. They see nothing inconsistent about having the deepest contempt for this war while expressing the utmost admiration for the soldiers on the front lines.

Last fall, I traveled to Iraq and I visited with our troops. My conversations with them confirmed what I already knew: These are uniquely loyal, intelligent, and courageous Americans. If only those civilians who are running this war had half the honor and integrity of the men and women who are fighting it.

It is time, Mr. Speaker, this Congress caught up to the American people. It is time that the Commander in Chief stepped up by offering a solution, instead of dismissing American anxiety as just politics. It is time to establish a multilateral security force to keep the peace in Iraq while shifting the U.S. role from military occupier to reconstruction partner. It is time to give Iraq back to the Iraqis, not continuing to occupy the bases, not attempting to control their oil.

This is what the American people want, Mr. Speaker. They want an end to this war. They are not certain exactly how or when, but that is our job to execute those details. They are looking to us for leadership. It is time this Congress and the President of the United States provided the leadership to bring our troops home.

Mr. Speaker, this morning the President of the United States said this about Iraq: ``My message to the enemy is don't count on us leaving before we succeed. Don't bet on American politics forcing my hand because it's not going to happen.''

Except, Mr. Speaker, it is completely unclear what constitutes success under these circumstances. Saying we will stand down when they stand up, well, that is just a talking point that gives the American people no clear guide as to when they can expect this war to end.

By leaving this question vague, by defining success entirely on his own secret terms, the President is allowing himself an open-ended commitment and a blank check in Iraq. As for his hand being forced by American politics, what the President calls American politics is actually a majority of Americans, American citizens outraged at the loss of life, the hundreds of billions spent, and the global credibility we have squandered.

Our people see 2,499, as of yesterday, U.S. troops killed; more than 18,000 U.S. soldiers gravely wounded, and thousands of others mentally and physically traumatized from their experience in the war. They see us losing the equivalent of one battalion every month in Iraq.

And they want answers.

All these sacrifices, and for what? None of it is making Americans or Iraqis safer. In fact, the presence of nearly 150,000 American troops in Iraq has become a rallying point for antiAmerican extremists in the Arab world.

This war becomes a bigger catastrophe with every passing day. And yet the President and the Republican majority have no plan to end it. From the President we get the usual platitudes and this week a photo-op in Iraq. And in this body, what is supposed to be the people's House, we are embarking on a pointless debate on a nonbinding Iraq resolution that is long on rhetoric and short on constructive solutions.

It is time we listened to the American people. It is time that the Commander in Chief stepped up by offering a solution instead of dismissing Americans' anxieties as ``just politics.''

I have outlined a plan that will end the occupation in Iraq while helping Iraq build a free and democratic society. We must engage the international community, including the U.N. and NATO, to establish a multinational interim security force for Iraq. The U.N.'s Department of Peacekeeping Operations is particularly well suited for this task.

We must shift the U.S. role from that of Iraq's military occupier to its reconstruction partner by working with the Iraqi people to rebuild their economic and physical infrastructure, and we must work with the U.N. to establish an International Peace Commission comprised of members of the global community who have experience in international conflict resolution to oversee Iraq's postwar reconciliation process.

They, our troops, have served admirably. They have sacrificed more than enough. We can return them to their families and we can do it without abandoning Iraq. This is what the American people want, Mr. Speaker. They want an end to this war. They are not certain exactly how or when, but it is our job to execute those details. They are looking to us for leadership and it is time the President of the United States, as the Commander in Chief, provided it.

Mr. Speaker, Americans woke up yesterday morning to the news that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed in an air raid in Iraq. Even though he was a vicious man, who had contempt for every single thing America represents, I do not believe his death signals a particular turning point in the Iraq War.

There have been other supposed watershed moments that were loudly trumpeted by enthusiasts for this war, but none of those turned out to have long-term significance, and I do not believe this to be any different. It will disrupt the operational capability of al-Zarqawi's organization, but most certainly will not end the civil strife that has engulfed Iraq.

Although Zarqawi was the leader of a group called al Qaeda in Iraq, it is important to note that he was not closely allied to Osama bin Laden. In fact, the two men had something of a long-standing rivalry. Zarqawi's death is not in any way a blow to bin Laden and the al Qaeda that is responsible for 9/11.

Mr. Speaker, the insurgency is a decentralized force that extends well beyond the influence of a single man. As foreign policy scholar Ivo Daalder points out, the anarchy that has taken hold in Iraq cannot be attributed to just one terrorist. Iraq has mushroomed into what Daalder calls a ``large-scale sectarian conflict'' and what I would call a full-blown civil war.

Dueling militias, fueled by ethnic hostilities that are centuries old, are fighting for control of the streets of Iraq and leaving a trail of carnage and bloodshed in their wake. It is difficult to see how the elimination of one man changes that tragic dynamic.

To the extent that Zarqawi's death has any impact, it will probably further animate the insurgency and lead to even more violence.

We can never forget what Lieutenant Colonel Frederick Wellman said last year about the insurgents, and I will quote him. He said, ``We can't kill them all. When I kill one, I create three.'' So if killing one insurgent creates three more, what happens when you kill one of the most visible insurgent leaders?

And here is an interesting twist. If killing Zarqawi was a primary goal of the Bush administration, why did they not act when they had an opportunity 4 years ago? According to NBC News, on three separate occasions in 2002 and early 2004, Zarqawi was within our sights, but all three times, the plan for attack was vetoed at the White House and the National Security Council. Why the hesitation on the part of this famously trigger happy administration? According to NBC sources, it was all about selling the Iraq War.

At the time, the administration was furiously trying to build public support for the preemptive invasion of Iraq, resorting to all kinds of misinformation if necessary. And they did not want to lose the public relations value of keeping Zarqawi alive and dangerous, which just goes to show that this misadventure in Iraq seems to have always been more important to the administration than actually stopping terrorists.

Remember when the President made the reference to: ``Wanted, Dead or Alive''? Maybe the real motto should have been: ``Wanted, Dead or Alive, Unless You Might Be a Useful Propaganda Tool.''

Mr. Speaker, conditions in Iraq are unspeakable. According to the BBC, the morgues in Baghdad alone have reported more than 6,000 violent deaths so far this year, an average of 40 a day in a single city.

The administration lit the match that ignited this inferno. The death of al-Zarqawi will not extinguish it. We must remove the one thing that gave rise to the violence in the first place, the very appearance of American occupation.

For the safety of our Nation and the long-term stability of Iraq, there is only one answer: Bring our troops home.

Mr. Speaker, I rise with great pleasure to celebrate my friend Beth Ashley on the occasion of her 80th birthday. Beth has enriched so many lives in Marin County, CA, through her years of accomplished writing for the Marin Independent Journal as well as for her passionate immersion in varied aspects of life in the community and around the globe.

Born in Massachusetts, Beth moved many times in her early years as the family sought financial stability during the Depression. With the help of her supportive family, she developed an interest in writing and worked on school newspapers. They moved to Marin in 1942, and, after finishing her junior year in high school, Beth entered Stanford University where she became editor of the Stanford Daily. She graduated in 1947 with majors in journalism and political science.

Beth's journalism career began in Marin at KTIM radio and included stints in southern California and Europe before her first job at the Independent Journal, IJ, as a copy editor in 1953. She soon became news editor, one of only two women with such a position in California at that time. Except for a 12-year break to raise her children and a brief foray into a public relations business, Beth has been an important fixture in several different roles at the IJ. She currently shines as a feature writer.

Raising her five sons--including two from the previous marriage of her second husband, Ross Ashley--was a role Beth also relished. She loved her years as a homemaker but retuned to work when her husband died of cancer in 1971.

Another constant in Beth's life has been travel, which feeds her curiosity as well as nourishing her compassion for others. She has written movingly on topics such as the food shortages in Moscow in the early years of Glasnost to the struggles of women in Afghanistan trying to recover from years of repressive Taliban rule, and she is currently involved in Iran and its people on the ground, as well as in Darfur.

Beth has been a positive force on nonprofit boards in Marin County including the Marin Aids Political Action Committee, Love is the Answer, the Marin Education Fund, and the Red Cross. She has won numerous awards for her community service, awards which reflect her caring and commitment. She also published a book, entitled, of course, Marin, which captures the same essence of the area that is reflected in her features.

Readers of the IJ look forward eagerly to Beth's columns which illuminate all aspects of life in Marin County as well as capturing deeper feelings about our global world and our shared humanity. Reflecting on the life of a young girl who is working in Darfur, Sudan, with Doctors Without Borders, Beth mused, ``Young people today do remarkable things--eschewing personal comfort, risking their lives--to help humanity in the rest of the world.... And I felt stirrings of regret that I had never fulfilled a long-ago urge to change the work with unselfish service of my own.''

Fortunately, she adds to these ruminations, ``My life has been happier than I could ever have dreamed.'' Her happiness, caring, and concern shine through both in person and in the newspaper. Beth's writings have been a remarkable and unselfish service to the people of her community and beyond, but to Beth, her children are one of the most important legacies anyone could have.

Mr. Speaker, today it is my privilege to thank Beth Ashley for what she has given to us and to join with thousands of others in wishing her a happy 80th birthday.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Joseph Verdu, a man who was loved and admired by many people in my hometown of Petaluma, California. Joe passed away on November 5, 2003, at the age of 69. On May 20, 2006, friends and family gathered for the dedication and renaming of McDowell Field to the Joseph F. Verdu Athletic Field.

Joe deserved this honor. He was active in youth sports in Petaluma, inspiring many young people with his warmth and commitment. He helped organize the Petaluma Youth Soccer League and served as its president for three years. He was also vice president of the California Youth Soccer Association for two years and on the board of the Petaluma Valley Little League. The City honored him with a Community Recognition Award in 1978 and the State of California with the Parks and Recreation Department Outstanding Service Award in 1979.

Born in San Francisco in 1934, Joe graduated from Lowell High School, attended UC Berkeley, and served in the United States Air Force from 1954-1958. He married his sweetheart Sylvia Magnani in 1957. The couple lived in Santa Clara until his job with Kimberly-Clark brought him to Petaluma in 1970.

Joe is survived by his wife Sylvia and their eight sons: Joseph, William, Stephen, Thomas, Mark, David, Paul, and Michael. When he died, he had 16 grandchildren; now there are 17.

Mr. Speaker, Sylvia describes her husband as ``a wonderful family man'' with a ``magnetic personality that made him popular with everyone who knew him.'' I know that description rings true for me and my family. We miss Joseph Verdu's humor and spirit, and I am proud to honor him for his service to the youth of Petaluma.

Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably detained on June 6 and June 7 and as a result I missed rollcall votes Nos. 223, 224, 225, 226, 227, 228, 229 and 230. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye'' on rollcall votes Nos. 226 and 229, and ``nay'' on rollcall votes Nos. 223, 224, 225, 227, 228, and 230.

Mr. Speaker, a few days ago, President Bush said that we had reached a turning point in Iraq. Given that he declared ``Mission Accomplished'' and the end of major combat operations more than 3 years ago, I would say it is about time we reached a turning point.

But as the Washington Post pointed out, this kind of turning point language is pretty commonplace for the President. There have been many milestones. There have been many turning points from this White House, even a turning point in the history of freedom over the last several years. The President should ask the people who risk their lives, their bodies, and their minds every day, just walking down the streets of Baghdad, if they see a turning point. We should ask the Iraqi citizens how they see it.

The day after the President's last attempt at spin, more than 30 Iraqis were murdered in violent attacks. They joined tens of thousands of other innocent civilians, many of them children, who have died for the cause of their so-called ``liberation.'' There are some rumblings now about drawing down our troop levels, but we have heard that before, and I will believe it when I see it, and I will believe it to be real when the President puts forward a plan on how he is going to end this war.

Mr. Speaker, I have yet to hear the President disavow his statement that the decision to bring our troops home will be for future Presidents to decide. I have yet to hear a clear denial from the administration that we have plans to build permanent military bases in Iraq. If there is some kind of reduction in U.S. forces, my fear is that it will be a cosmetic change only, driven more by the political calendar than any kind of strategic consideration, ultimately making the troops left in Iraq even more vulnerable than they are now.

The answer is not to get down to 100,000 troops by the end of the year, because incremental steps are not enough. There must be a plan to immediately end this occupation and bring every last one of our soldiers home. The longer they stay, the longer suicide bombings will persist, because our very presence is one of the principal causes of the violence.

That is not our soldiers' fault. Of course, it isn't. They have performed their services faithfully and courageously. It is their civilian supervisors who have miscalculated at every turn. It is the President, the Vice President, and the Secretary of Defense who refuse to see that our military presence is fueling the rage of the insurgency, intensifying hatred for America, and stoking the fires of civil war.

Mr. Speaker, it is time for an entirely new approach to Iraq. It is time for the United States to show real global leadership by helping assemble a multinational security force to help keep Iraq stable in the short term. It is time to help establish an international peace commission under the auspices of the U.N. to begin the Iraq postwar reconciliation process. It is time to turn Iraq over to the Iraqi people. It is time to stop being Iraq's military occupier and start being Iraq's reconstruction partner. It is time to rebuild the country we have torn apart and to do it with an emphasis on transparency and accountability and not on padding Halliburton's profit margins.

But before we take these steps, before we do anything, we must end the war and bring our troops home to their families, where they belong. That is the turning point that will make a real difference in the Iraq situation.