During the House debate on the Iraq Resolution, Heather Wilson (R-NM) started following the old GOP meme that the Democrats are cutting funding to the troops. She even said that the resolution will prevent the troops from getting the necessary body armor.
Steny Hoyer has had enough. Following Wilson’s remarks he came to the floor to rebut them. Here is the clip, followed by an interesting exchange between Hoyer and Duncan Hunter (R-CA).
Video was just uploaded so give it a minute.
The Republicans continue to try and twist what this resolution says. They don’t want to debate the President’s strategy. Instead they try to hide behind the troops and turn this into a political attack. Fortunately it is not working.
I included the exchange between Hoyer and Hunter because of the absurd comments made by Hunter (and this guy wants to be President?). His excuse for our troops not having all the necessary armor was “we didn’t have it from 1776 until just a few years ago”. With that kind of thinking, why didn’t we just send the troops in on horse back with muskets?
Remember back a couple of years ago when a soldier in Iraq asked Rumsfeld about the armored humvees in storage and why they aren’t using them? There have been countless reports come out that our military is failing in armoring our soldiers (see here for the latest) and even reports that much of that armament is being diverted to the contractors.
We are the United States of America, the remaining super power. We should be damn well able to make sure our military goes into harms way with the best of everything. Duncan Hunter’s little rational was way off base and an insult to the people of this country and the people serving in Iraq. How does the families of fallen soldiers feel when they hear his excuse of “well we didn’t have it in 1776”?
Hunter’s response echoes those of his defense of the Gitmo detainees.