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Mr. Speaker, I rise with indeed a heavy heart, as so many in America do. This is an extraordinary time in our country. My heart goes out to all of those thousands and thousands of people in the gulf area that have lost everything. This is one of our darkest hours, and let us hope some bright light can shine very, very quickly. But in order for that bright light to shine, Mr. Speaker, we must realize the importance of having an investigation quickly.

Let me hurry up and say that this investigation is not a blame game, because we already know where the blame is. It is for those individuals who had the responsibility. It has been a failure of leadership at the national level. Here in Congress, a failure of leadership. At the White House, a failure of leadership. The President, a failure of leadership. Our military, a failure of leadership. And our Homeland Security, a failure of leadership. In FEMA, a failure of leadership. And we must examine that now so that we can prepare quickly for the next disaster, because it is coming, or a terrorist attack. There have been mistakes after mistakes after mistakes. That is why we need a thorough investigation of what went wrong in the Federal response to Katrina , and why there was such a delay. Delay after delay after delay.

We must not try to skirt around and assume and put blame, unrighteous blame, on the city of New Orleans and their police department and mayor, who were victims. They were suffering from the flood. They were suffering from the hurricane. Here is a Category 5 hurricane coming at a city 6 feet below sea level and 30 percent of its population below the poverty level. Where was that plan? Their police departments immediately disseminated. Several of their policemen were killed in the flood. They were not able to do it. And then to hide behind and go to the Governor and say, where is the Governor in this? We cannot fault the Governor for this, nor the mayor. This was a national disaster, and the national leadership failed.

We must move quickly to get an investigation so we can determine what went wrong. The need for this investigation, like I said, is not simply to find blame, but it is to prepare us for future disasters and attacks. We cannot delay in this investigation, because time is of the essence. Questions must be asked and corrections in the system must be made while the timeline of the responses is still fresh in our minds of actually what happened and why, because we do not know how soon the next event will happen.

This was on television, Mr. Speaker, for everyone to see. We cannot run and hide from this one. And I tell my colleagues, in looking at the television, no matter what it is, this is not a Republican problem, it is not a Democratic problem; it is an American problem, and America is expecting us to stand up for America.

There are two essential questions that must be raised and answered. The first one is, why did it take the military so long? Six days. Bodies floating in New Orleans. Flooding up to the rooftops. People trying to get rescued. And on every television station, Fox News, Shepard Smith, my hat is off to him. Tears in his eyes saying, Where is our military? Where are people, Geraldo, cradling a baby, with tears coming down his face. Where is our President? Where is our Congress? Where is our FEMA? Where is our Homeland Security? A failure. We deserve to investigate this quickly, and get answers.

And then the other question, Mr. Speaker, that is on everybody's mind is this one: What role did race and poverty and class play in this?

We cannot hide behind the sensitivities of this. Some of these questions are very unpleasant. They were not created by you or me, but they are there. Those were black and poor people who feel that if those people were white, that would not be happening if they were white and middle class. I am not the only one asking this. African Americans are not the only ones asking this. White people, too, are asking this. We need an investigation to get to the bottom of this particular question.

And then this other question, Mr. Speaker: Why can an administration who can, without a declaration of war, without authority from Congress, invade another country, topple its government, and then can do it in 24 or 72 hours, but it took them 6 days to respond to sick children and people on ventilators who had passed away. We have to ask the question, Mr. Speaker, because the great tragedy here is not Katrina , it is the tens of thousands of American citizens' lives that were lost because their Federal Government failed them. We owe it to the American people, Mr. Speaker, to quickly put together a commission, just like we did with 9/11, with subpoena power, and get to the bottom of this and fix it so that we can put back together and protect this country.