Usaid

Floor Speech

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Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, I want to thank my colleague from Hawaii. If he can spare 30 seconds, I would like to tell him a story.

Years ago, I went to India to the dusty villages--not the big cities--just to see what USAID was doing. I heard about it. I wanted to see it. The most graphic example I can remember from that experience was when they showed me a bag of some grain supplement, and on it was written ``USAID from the people of the United States of America.'' What they were doing with this was making a lunch for the children in the village. I don't think your kids or mine would have touched it. It looked like some odd rice crispy ball that was held together with water. They sat with little tin plates with this rice crispy ball on it from the USAID package to eat their lunch. But before they ate their lunch, they paused. I said, ``What is going on?'' The guide said to me: They are saying a prayer of thanks to this United States of America for giving them food to eat.

I thought to myself, for goodness' sake, it is 1 percent of our Federal budget--1 percent--that we spend in this manner to try to give kids around the world a chance to survive. There are many other things we do, but that basic example with those kids sitting in the dust of that village eating that rice crispy ball and thanking the United States of America for it touched my heart and still does to this day. Thanks for what you said. I appreciate it so much.

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