9/11 Commission Recommendations

9/11 COMMISSION RECOMMENDATIONS -- (House of Representatives - September 09, 2004)

(Mr. PENCE asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. PENCE. Madam Speaker, 3 years ago this Saturday, at precisely this hour, I found myself standing in the sunlight of a September morning in this city near the elm tree on the Capitol grounds. Like so many of my colleagues, I experienced September 11 in Washington, D.C., and not just the smoke-filled skies and pandemonium that followed those moments, but I experienced the lack of deliberation that followed those times.

It is in that spirit that I rise, as I did the day the 9/11 Commission report was produced, to say that this Congress should proceed with deliberation, but as one of my Democrat colleagues said, with dispatch, in considering and enacting many, if not all, of the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission.

The people of this country believe that they have sent us here, men and women in Congress, to consider the changes that are necessary to advance the security and liberty of the American people; not to write a blank check to independent commissions, but to deliberate, because, God forbid, should a day strike America like that day in September again, or like the days that have struck the people of Russia or of Spain in recent days, there will be a lack of deliberation, and the opportunity to thoughtfully consider these proposals will have gone by.