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Letter to Members of US Senate on Censuring Richard Durbin
By Newt Gingrich
CNSNews.com Information Services
June 20, 2005

(Editor's Note: Following is the text of Speaker Newt Gingrich's letter to the members of the United States Senate.)

Office of Speaker Newt Gingrich
June 18, 2005
U.S. Senate
Capitol Hill
Washington, DC

Dear Senator:

By his statements equating American treatment of suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay with the behavior of the evil regimes of Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and Pol Pot's Cambodia, Senator Richard Durbin has dishonored the United States and the entire U.S. Senate. Only by a vote to censure Senator Durbin for his conduct can the U.S. Senate restore its dignity and defend American honor.

Senator Durbin's comparison, sadly, is despicable.

U.S. Senators should be clear about the gravity of Senator Durbin's comparison. Nine million innocent human beings were murdered in Hitler's death camps, nearly three million perished in the gulags under Stalin, and more than one and a half million were slaughtered in the killing fields of Cambodia at the hand of Pol Pot. And while not a single terrorist has died in detention at Guantanamo, Senator Durbin sees fit to liken our American service men and women to the terrifying murderers of three evil despotic regimes.

Moreover, Senator Durbin equates the terrorist detainees at Guantanamo with the millions of innocent men, women, and children exterminated by the order of evil dictators. The fact that he did so as a high ranking member of the Senate on the Senate floor makes his comparison all the more shocking.

This moral equivalence isn't just utterly false; it endangers the lives of our young men and women in the military because it arms every radical Islamist with the official-record words of a Senate leader to justify their war of terror against civilized people everywhere.

Senator Durbin's statement of "regret" on Friday has only compounded the need for the Senate to act. In it, Senator Durbin said that "I have learned from my statement that historical parallels can be misused and misunderstood. I sincerely regret if what I said caused anyone to misunderstand my true feelings ... "

Incredibly, Senator Durbin is sticking to his original assertion that there is indeed, in his own words, an "historic parallel" between U.S. soldiers at Guantanamo Bay and the killers under Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. In other words, his only regret is that Americans don't understand his misreading of history and that he has caused us to misunderstand him. Offering no apology for the original slanderous statement itself, Senator Durbin has chosen instead to actually defend his comparisons. This defense makes his original speech all the more revolting.

It's one thing for one Senator to endanger young Americans and defame America; it would be the shame of the Senate if the other 99 senators did not stand up to defend America and to defend the reputation of our young men and women in uniform.

A Senate censure of Senator Durbin is justified and would reaffirm a standard for healthy, rational debate. By voting for or against the censure, the rest of the members of the U.S. Senate can go on record and make clear how they judge Senator Durbin's characterization of American soldiers. It will also send a clear message to terrorists who will use the words of a Senate leader against us that the Senate stands in support of America and our military and against those who seek to destroy the free people of the United States.

There is historic precedent for censuring Senators whose words bring dishonor and disrepute on the Senate and impair its dignity; Senator Durbin's words fit that precedent.

In this case, expressing outrage is not enough. It is time for the Senate to act. Senator Durbin must be censured now.

Sincerely,
Newt Gingrich
Former Speaker of the United States House of Representatives

Source
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Fat, Bald and Ugly - And PROUD Of It!

[Me#1You#10]

Newt '08?

[Tanya]

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2005/6/20/121154.shtml

Media Blackout as Cheney Blasts Durbin

"Vice President Dick Cheney became the highest-ranking Bush administration official yet to castigate Sen. Dick Durbin on Friday for comparing of U.S. troops to Nazis.

And Cheney words were, by far, the harshest yet uttered against the top Democrat by any senior elected Republican."\

But so far, at least, mainstream reporters have steadfastly ignored Cheney's remarks - perhaps because they know that the VP's reaction rachets the story up to Defcon 3 level, and covering it would make it impossible for Democrats to continue their silence."

~snip~
Media reaction? A Lexis Nexis search shows not a single newspaper, wire service or TV news show covering any of the above quotes.

Compare Cheney's words with Sen. John McCain's more tepid reaction to the Durbin outrage, which garnered widespread coverage.

"He should certainly apologize," McCain told NBC's "Meet the Press," saying that Durbin had done "a great disservice to the men and women in the military who are serving honorably down there."

A "disservice"?

More at the above link:

[Tanya]

http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/005/752ovekh.asp

Breaking the Durbin Code
What Dick Durbin said, what he really meant, and why the Senate should vote to censure him.
by Hugh Hewitt
06/20/2005 12:00:00 AM

"SENATE MAJORITY LEADER BILL FRIST and Judiciary Chairman Arlen Specter should move this week to initiate a censure resolution of Illinois Senator Dick Durbin for his remarks on the Senate's floor on June 14, 2005. Not only did Durbin's remarks injure America's position in the world, provide an enormous propaganda victory to the enemy, and slander the United States military, they also represent an escalation in the political rhetoric of the left, which is designed to undermine the public's confidence in the military, the administration, and the war. The censure resolution will oblige every senator to go on the record about how they view the American military as we enter the long phase of the war.

The outrage over Dick Durbin's comparison of interrogation practices at Gitmo to the Nazi, Soviet, and Pol Pot regimes has deeply injured Durbin's reputation and the reputation of the Democratic party that keeps him in the number two leadership position in the United States Senate."

[blue9t3]

Oh! now I get it, Dick H. Bin-Durbin is sorry that stupid me didnt get what he meant!.....gimme a break, that chump is a waste of skin!
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MOPAR-BUYER

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