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“MATTERS OF NATIONAL IMPORTANCE” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Justice was published in the House of Representatives section on pages H2956-H2957 on May 11, 2000.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
MATTERS OF NATIONAL IMPORTANCE
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Duncan) is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise this afternoon to briefly discuss two unrelated but very important matters of national importance.
Last year, we spent billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars bombing Kosovo. As the Scripps-Howard Newspapers said a few weeks ago, ``the outcome certainly has not been a happy one.'' As the Scripps-Howard chain noted, ``many innocent civilians killed.''
How cavalierly we brush over that, ``many innocent civilians killed.'' Hundreds of innocent civilians killed and we are not ashamed of that for some reason. Hundreds of thousands made homeless by our actions. We wasted billions of hard-earned tax dollars to make a situation many times worse than it would have been if we had simply stayed out. We bombed people who would like to have been our friends, and we bombed in a situation, and bombed repeatedly, where there was no threat whatsoever to our national security and no vital U.S. interest at stake.
To make things even worse, Newsweek Magazine this week has a major story entitled The Kosovo Coverup. Listen to what part of this article says. ``An antiseptic war, fought by pilots flying safely three miles high. It seems almost too good to be true, and it was. In fact, as some critics suspected at the time, the air campaign against the Serb military in Kosovo was largely ineffective. NATO bombs plowed up some fields, blew up hundreds of cars, trucks, and decoys, and barely dented Serb artillery and armor. According to a suppressed Air Force report obtained by Newsweek, the number of targets verifiably destroyed was a tiny fraction of those claimed: 14 tanks, not 120, as claimed; 18 armored personnel carriers, not 220; 20 artillery pieces, not 450. Out of the 744 `confirmed strikes' by NATO pilots during the war, the Air Force investigators who spent weeks combing Kosovo by helicopter and by foot found evidence of just 58.''
About 5 years ago, I remember reading on the front page of The Washington Post one day that we had our troops in Haiti picking up garbage and settling domestic disputes. A couple of years ago, I remember another Member on this floor saying we had our troops in Bosnia giving rabies shots to dogs. Well, I have nothing whatsoever against the Haitians, but they should pick up their own garbage. And I have nothing whatsoever against the Bosnians, but they should give their own rabies shots.
We should stop sending our troops into situations where there is no vital U.S. interest at stake and no threats to national security and turning our military into international social workers and spending billions and billions of hard-earned tax dollars in the process.
This administration has committed troops to other countries 36 times more than the six previous administrations put together. Mr. Speaker, it is time for this type of thing to stop.
Mr. Speaker, the other unrelated topic I wanted to discuss was this predawn raid of the home where Elian Gonzalez lived in Miami.
All of the polls showed that most of the people thought that this young man should have been with his father. And as a father myself, I certainly can understand that. But regardless of what people thought about the custody, everyone should have been shocked and saddened by that picture of that INS border agent in full riot gear pointing that submachinegun at that little boy. Anyone who was not shocked or saddened by that, I think, does not really appreciate freedom.
I want my colleagues to listen to what three very liberal left-wing people have said about this just recently. A.M. Rosenthal, the very liberal former Executive Editor of The New York Times said ``The armed invasion of the home of Elian's relatives in Miami by federal officers combat-ready with the deadliest of military rifles, the shocking abduction of the boy seen around the world, are so unconstitutional and cruel that they keep the hope alive that this time the courts and Congress will not allow the White House to get away with it.''
Laurence H. Tribe, the very liberal law professor from Harvard, writing in The New York Times said, ``Ms. Reno's decision to take the law as well as the child into her own hands seems worse than a political blunder. Even if well intended, her decision strikes at the heart of constitutional government and shakes the safeguards of liberty.''
And the very left wing, Alan Dershowitz, another Harvard law professor writing in the Los Angeles Times said this, ``By enforcing its own order, without the judicial imprimatur of a court mandate, the Justice Department has reinforced a precedent that endangers the rights of all American citizens.''
Mr. Speaker, I was a Circuit Court judge in Tennessee for 7\1/2\ years before coming to Congress, and I believe that the Justice Department has grown so arrogant, abusive, and out of control that, unless we greatly downsize this department and decrease its funding, the freedom of all Americans is in jeopardy.
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