Quote:
Mr. Speaker --
My Democratic colleagues are coming down here accusing us of slandering our friend and fellow member, Rep. Murtha.
That's absurd.
This isn't about him.
It's not about any of us.
This is about foreign policy.
And quite frankly this idea on the left that we can and should immediately withdraw is not only a bad idea, it's a dangerous one.
How do you tell an 19 year old American fighting, bleeding for their country that this is all pointless? How dare you. You may not agree with the way things are being managed, but don't you minimize the importance of what we're doing in Iraq.
You all on the left opened up this debate with your irresponsible comments and now you're trying to sneak out of the room to avoid the topic.
The left in Congress wants a debate on the idea of immediate withdrawal and we're going to have it.
The left wanted to run their mouths with no regard to the big picture, well now you're going to have to stand here and take the heat for that.
We're fighting because we don't want our kids living in a world dominated by terrorism. That's why we're fighting.
The left works real hard to isolate Iraq from the Middle East and from terrorism.
Does the left actually think terrorists separate Iraq from the war on terrorism.
Certainly not. Absolutely not.
I don't believe America is willing to give up on what is a WAR for the FREE WORLD.
The left wanted this debate. We'll have this debate. And you will lose this debate.
The American people have stronger backbones than the radical left running the Democratic Party in this House.
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The final vote is 403-3 (6 present, 22 not voting) on immediate withdrawal from Iraq. So, when Democrats hold press conferences stating we should 'immediately redeploy' ('Retreat hell! We're just redeploying gradually in a different direction when 'practicable!'), they are speaking figuratively.