mr. chairman , we know the right questions to ask : about iraq , the budget , waste , fraud and abuse by contractors including halliburton . 
after seeing scenes from an iraqi prison , we know what we do n't know . 
what are we going to do about all this ? 
we know the right questions to ask , but we also know these questions will not be answered -- unless we reach back into recent history and reinstitute an independent , bi-partisan internal watchdog . 
in the 1940s , the truman committee saved the government and the american people $ 15 billion dollars . 
they asked the right questions and were empowered to get the answers . 
the american people got what they paid for and someone made sure of it . 
there was truth in government . 
there was trust in government . 
we do n't have that kind of faith , confidence , or oversight anymore . 
instead of scrutiny , there is subterfuge . 
already , america has spent $ 200 billion for the wars in iraq and afghanistan . 
yet two years after the start of the war , many troops and their transports still do not have adequate protection . 
this week , the administration will use the supplemental process to obtain new billions for iraq . 
the fact is , the supplemental process carries less scrutiny than the normal budget process . 
we know the right questions to ask , but getting the answers is a different story . 
billions of dollars have been awarded in non-competitive contracts . 
recently , the military acknowledged that 8 billion in cold , hard cash is missing in iraq . 
it 's happened before in iraq , and unless something changes , there is no reason to believe it wo n't happen again . 
halliburton has already been found to have overcharged the pentagon by billions of dollars for providing meals to soldiers and importing fuel . 
they 're still getting paid and no one really knows if we are getting what the american people are paying for . 
on a rare occasion , the defense secretary admits there is an issue ; quoting secretary rumsfeld : `` according to some estimates , we ( dod ) can not track $ 2.3 trillion in transactions. '' the pentagon 's own auditors admit that the military can not account for as much as 1/4 of what it spends . 
defense makes up half of all the discretionary spending in the budget . 
standard issue republican rhetoric decries waste , fraud and abuse . 
well , it 's time to turn the rhetoric into a plan of action . 
the truman committee eliminated corruption , profiteering and mismanagement . 
it uncovered defective systems , improved efficiencies in existing programs , and freed up billions of dollars for more crucial procurement . 
