MSNBC Hardball-Transcript

MSNBC Hardball-Transcript

MATTHEWS: OK. Thank you very much, David Gregory, chief White House correspondent for NBC News.

What is the U.S. Congress doing to help bring home U.S. troops? What comes next in the fight to take on president—the president and the war? U.S. Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart, a Republican whose district includes big chunks of Miami in Florida; and U.S. Congressman Chaka Fattah is Democrat who is running for mayor of Philadelphia. And he is, I think, upstairs at this point from me right now in the same studio.

Thank you, Congressman Fattah. Thank you Congressman Diaz-Balart. Let me ask you this question about this treatment of American wounded. All of those tremendous numbers of amputees at Walter Reed, Congressman Diaz-Balart, your reaction when you heard the story?

REP. MARIO DIAZ-BALART (D), FLORIDA: Chris, there is—I don‘t care what anybody says, there is no excuse, there is no explanation. It‘s totally intolerable. I am outraged, like I think just about every American. You know, despite partisan differences that we may have, I think the fact that some of our troops are not getting the best coverage or the best care and the best treatment is frankly totally unacceptable.

And there is no reason for it and there‘s no excuse for it. It cannot happen. It had better stop. And I understand there‘s even legislation already been filed to make sure that never happens again.

MATTHEWS: Congressman Fattah, your reaction when you read the story?

REP. CHAKA FATTAH (D), PENNSYLVANIA: Well, first of all, we need to get our young people home from Iraq. Too many of them are coming home wounded and ending up at Walter Reed. I visited there and I—you have to know that there‘s some great doctors and staff at Walter Reed and they‘re dealing with some very challenging wounds for our soldiers.

But there are concerns that have been raised by this story. And I know that Chairman Murtha and Chairman Young and others are working on this right now. We have to have a commitment. The worst wounded among our young people end up at Walter Reed, sometimes after a stopover in Germany.

But these are young people—I met Cassandra Bryant (ph) there, a young lady who lost both her legs, 20 years old. She deserves the best care that our country can provide. And every one of the almost 20,000 who have been severely wounded deserve that.

But the other thing we need to do is stop the—to stop putting our young people in harm‘s way. The British are leaving. The only person who has not come to the conclusion that we should get out of the way of this civil war in Iraq is George Bush. And the Congress has now spoken. The American people spoke last year in the November election.

And I would just hope that since his only real partner in this effort, Tony Blair, is now taking a step back and going to announce, you know, a step-down of British troops, that finally this president would admit, as much as it may harm his ego, that this is a mistaken course.

And for the almost 3,000 dead, now, Chris, you‘re back home in Philly, you know, Celeste Zappala, Mrs. Jeffcoat, there are plenty of mothers in Philadelphia and throughout our state who have lost their loved ones in Iraq. And we should not have another young person lose their life for this cause.

MATTHEWS: Let me hear congressman Diaz-Balart on that very point. Do you think it‘s time to bring our troops home, Congressman, or not?

DIAZ-BALART: Chris, we need to bring our troops home the earliest possible moment that we can. However, if we bring them home prematurely and that government of Iraq falls, we have to remember the consequences. Think about what a small, little country with no wealth that fell into the hands of the terrorists was able to do to destroy a big part of an American city during 9/11.

It should be I think relatively easy to understand for every American that it is not in our national interest for Iraq to either fall in the hands of terrorist groups or of a terrorist state like Iran. So we need to bring our troops home but we need to make sure that first there is a government there that will not only not be a terrorist state but hopefully will help us fight those terrorist groups so they don‘t get a foothold in Iraq like they.

MATTHEWS: But that is not what we‘re—but, Congressman, that is not what we are doing every day. Every day our troops—we‘re watching pictures of them now, are fighting on behalf of the Shia government, the majority over there, against the Sunni insurgents. Would George Washington ever have agreed.

DIAZ-BALART: Chris, they‘re fighting on behalf of the democratically-elected.

MATTHEWS: All right. Just a minute, just a minute, the president of the United States yesterday was at Mount Vernon. I respect him a lot for this. He went there in back (ph) paid respect to George Washington. George Washington made a final plea to the American people when he left office: don‘t get involved in these foreign entanglements. How did we get in the job of supporting the power of the Shia over the Sunni in a civil war? Why are we fighting that war?

DIAZ-BALART: Chris, Chris, the issue of why we are there.

(CROSSTALK)

DIAZ-BALART: The issue of why we‘re there is something that has been debated and will continue to be debated. But the reality is we are there. So now, for example, you know, the president just—the commander-in-chief, after, you know, meeting with his leadership on the field, decided to send reinforcements to Baghdad.

I hate to tell you this, but the 500 -- you know, the members of Congress are not Patton or MacArthur. We are not generals who understand what exactly the right thing is to do on the—you know, on the field in Iraq. Those who know what to do are the ones who are there. And what I‘m telling you is, nobody is telling us that it is in their best interests of the United States to allow Iraq to fall in the hands of terrorists or of Iran.

If that‘s the case, if we can at least agree to that, then the question has to be asked, what‘s the best way to stop that from happening?

MATTHEWS: OK. Just this word.

DIAZ-BALART: That is what we need to be discussing.

MATTHEWS: Just this use of the word "terrorism" every time we don‘t like somebody, they‘re on the other side of a war with us, we call them terrorists. It doesn‘t help explain the situation in Iraq. We did not go into Iraq to fight terrorists. We went in to topple Saddam Hussein, who was a Baathist secularist who was not even Islamist. We got into a situation over there. The question is, how do we get out?

Congressman Fattah, the last word?

FATTAH: This is it. We‘ve been losing helicopters almost every other day. We have had two major attacks in which—at our bases that have lost troops. We‘re sitting ducks. What we need to do is either—either do as Murtha has suggested, redeploy to neighboring countries, if there‘s a terrorist threat, go back in and handle it.

Right now, our young people don‘t have anyone to shoot. They can‘t tell who the enemy really is. We‘re not providing them with the armored cars, the bullets they need. They‘ve run out of bullets in instances over there. They don‘t—they‘ve never had enough Kevlar vests. Either let them win a war that‘s winnable or move them out of harm‘s way.

MATTHEWS: OK. Thank you both. Congressmen Diaz-Balart, thank you, sir. And thank you, Congressman Fattah of Philadelphia

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