Just wanted to let everyone know that the transcript of JK's Floor Speech is up on the Dem Daily and I will have the video up later in the day, as well as video from SFRC yesterday.
http://blog.thedemocraticdaily.com/?p=5190John Kerry Speaks From the Heart on the Senate Floor About Iraq and His Decision Not to Run in ‘08January 25th, 2007 @ 10:49 am
Yesterday, John Kerry spoke from the Senate floor on his plan for Iraq and his decision not to run for president in ‘08. Senate Democrats are seeking support from the Republicans members of the Senate on the resolution passed in the SFRC yesterday that “dismissed Bush’s plans to increase troops in Iraq as “not in the national interest.”" It’s not enough, as Kerry noted yesterday on the Senate Floor in his eloquent and moving speech yesterday on his plans to ofer a resolution to bring the troops home.
I hope to have a video here of the speech, later today. Below is a transcript of his statement, as delivered:
Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, last November, the American people sent an unmistakable and incredibly important message to their elected leaders. They didn’t ask for it, they demanded a change of course in Iraq. The American people understand that the current strategy is not working. They have demanded that we honor the extraordinary effort of our troops by providing a strategy for Iraq that is actually worthy of their sacrifice. They don’t consider more of the same–additional troops essentially doing what they have been doing before–they don’t consider that anything other than an escalation of our military involvement, linked to the same mistakes and same illusions of the past. They don’t consider that an acceptable strategy.
This new Congress comes here with a mandate, as well as a moral obligation, to find not just a new way forward in Iraq but the right way forward. That is what we owe the families; that is what we owe those fighting forces.
It is clear the administration’s litany of mistakes has made an incredibly difficult task that much harder and has reduced what we can reasonably expect to accomplish. As the saying goes around here, we are where we are. The mistakes of the past do not change the fact that Congress bears some responsibility for getting us into this war and, therefore, must take responsibility for getting us out.
That responsibility starts by having a real bipartisan dialog on where we go from here. I believe we are finally at the point where that can happen. We all agree about the nobility of the service of our troops. We all agree about the incredible bravery of the men and women of our Armed Forces who put their lives on the line every single day in Iraq. We all want to see a stable Iraq. We all know Iraqis want to see it, too. We all agree on the need to preserve our vital national security interests in the region, and we all agree on the importance of preventing the violence in Iraq from spreading into a broader regional conflict. We all understand the need to prevent Iraq from becoming a safe haven for al-Qaida and like-minded terrorists. We all understand the potential of regional chaos and of failed states spreading one to the other.
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