Speech by Rep. John Tierney (D-Massachusetts), March 29, 2000

Speech by Rep. John Tierney (D-Massachusetts), March 29, 2000
Mr. TIERNEY. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi) for bringing this to our attention here today and also the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) for his efforts to make sure that this House would spend ample amount of time debating all the particulars of the path in which we seem to be headed.

This is, in fact, a situation where we are taking the wrong action and taking it with too little thought. What is before us would improve the bill and strike an appropriate balance between the supply and demand aspects of the problem that confronts us. The bill, as currently constructed, strikes us with a false assertion. It asserts that the United States involvement in this 40-year-old conflict would somehow correct the situation and stop drug dealing and drug use in this country. That somehow getting involved by training armed forces and providing helicopters is going to stop or reduce consumption in this country.

It tries to leave with us the impression that this has been well thought out and debated, but that is absolutely questionable when we think that General McCaffrey came before the subcommittee on which I sit and left with us the clear impression that there is much work to be done here. He acknowledged that it will take years to deploy the proposed helicopters out there to train the troops for the proposed task. He tells us that there are currently insufficiently trained and insufficient numbers of pilots to even get into those helicopters. They do not have the hangars to house those helicopters. And that we should know that some 5 years out we definitely will still be involved in this enterprise in a best situation.

The fact of the matter is we have to know that there are already 300,000 people that have been displaced in Colombia. If we go in on the current path, we are likely to see scores of thousands of others being displaced, and we are not taking proper precautions to resolve the situation that those people will find themselves in.

Yes, Mr. Chairman, things have gotten better in Bolivia and Peru; but things have gotten worse in Colombia as a result of that. And the action that we are embarking on today simply forces people in Colombia to grow these crops somewhere else, most likely Ecuador, maybe Panama or Mexico or somewhere beyond there. And we are not talking about what we might do to stop that from happening.

The statement of the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton) is one of the reasons that people on this side are very concerned about where we are going here. He talks about if things do not resolve quickly there, then we will need more United States troops. This is Nicaragua all over again. We do not seem to learn from our past mistakes. We should take the time to debate all the ramifications of this proposal and talk about it in depth and see if we cannot find a more balanced way to attack this problem.

Mr. Chairman, wealthier Colombians are leaving that country in droves. Apparently, they are more than willing to fight to the last drop of American blood. We can be helpful in this situation and we should, Mr. Chairman. We can support President Pastrana by providing resources to build infrastructure so crops can get to market profitably, to build confidence of the people there in the government by helping him to strike an even-handed effort against paramilitary as well as guerrilla forces, to build a court system to the point that it is effective, fair, and respected, to build schools and roads and community support, to build a competent, efficient respected police force and a military that does not favor the paramilitaries or ignore paramilitary atrocities.

Mr. Chairman, we can be balanced in our efforts. We can increase efforts for prevention and treatment here at home. And the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi) is exactly right in that regard. We do not have anywhere near the proper attention being spent on treatment and prevention in this country. It does bear repeating the fact that we have way too many people in our jails with alcohol and drug abuse problems and a problem that they cannot get a job when they are out, even if they do deal with drugs and alcohol, because we are not spending enough of our attention on making sure that they are educated and trained and capable of returning as productive citizens.

We do not start putting money in early enough for early childhood programs and Head Start and after-school programs, for community building and community programs to make sure that every one of our children has the ability to be productive and be happy citizens with hope. And we certainly are not providing enough attention and enough resources to make sure that those that are addicted, that have a drug or alcohol problem, get the kind of treatment that they need.

That is what this debate is about, Mr. Chairman, and I am so glad that the gentlewoman from California brought that up and the gentleman from Wisconsin made it clear that we are not spending the time that we need to debate all of these issues and the ramifications that will come from them.

As of March 30, 2000, this document was also available online at http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?r106:H29MR0-173: