Senator Bob Casey In The News

Here's something Senator Casey did recently:

Sen. Bob Casey stood on the Senate floor Wednesday and read the names of 169 soldiers killed in Iraq with ties to Pennsylvania.

He delivered a tribute to Pennsylvanians who have died in Iraq after voting for a measure that did not advance. The measure would have guaranteed that troops who fought in Iraq be allowed to stay home as long as they had been overseas.

Here's the text of what he said and a link to the video.

Earlier that day, the Republicans in the Senate killed the Webb amendment (S. 2012), an eminently logical amendment that would require the already overworked troops to be at home for at least as long as they were deployed in Iraq.

Senator Casey had this to say about the vote:

I am disappointed that procedural tactics were used to act as a rubberstamp for President Bush and to obstruct action to give troops more time at home between deployments. This amendment had the bipartisan support of 56 U.S. Senators.

After more than four years at war in Iraq and almost six years in Afghanistan, our troops have served multiple tours that have kept them away from their families and hurt our long-term military readiness.

We cannot state enough the effect that having a loved one deployed on what is often multiple tours has on a family or a community. Children are growing up seldom seeing their mothers or fathers. And by giving our troops less time to rest and train between deployments, our military readiness is undermined.”

And as I said, the Republican Senators dutifully killed the measure.

So much for supporting the troops.

Go watch the video. Casey reads the names of all 169 Pennsylvanians killed by dubya's war. They were real men and women with real families. Real lives ended. Someone has to pay some attention to them.