Are any efforts being made to at least postpone President Bush's phased in tax cuts given the events of September 11, 2001, the costs of the war effort, and the economic recession? Sen. Jan Schakowsky is one of the few in Congress who have publicly called for meeting other domestic needs before the tax cuts go into effect. She introduced legislation on October 2, 2001, to do just that.

Kennedy, Daschle and their Republican counterparts have made clear over the last 4 months that the nation is now facing new problems (on top of existing problems) and we cannot afford a debate over semantics. Instead, we must address the problems laid out by Daschle and Kennedy over the last 2 weeks and by the President in his State of the Union address next week.