Charles Rangel: “Mr. Speaker, we are here for act III of the tax follies of the year 2001. It is interesting. We have heard everyone say…”

“Mr. Speaker, we are here for act III of the tax follies of the year 2001. It is interesting. We have heard everyone say, and I do not need to repeat the fact, that there is no tax relief for 10 years. It is simply that they want the headline--they want the commercial with the line in it that says, ``I voted to repeal the estate tax.'' What they will not put in there is, ``I voted to repeal the estate tax in 2011.'' We are setting up commercials here today. No one seriously believes on either side of the aisle that the Senate is as crazy as to adopt this particular law. The reasons are very obvious. If we take a serious look at what laughingly is called the President's budget or the House's budget, there is no money in there to stabilize Social Security. There is no money in there to deal with what everybody admits is going to be the problem in 2010, when the baby boomers come into the Medicare system. Everybody out there listening to this who is 55 years old now and in 10 years will be 65, and is counting on that Social Security, and is counting on Medicare for the security it gives one economically ought to be listening to this debate and wondering, where are these people going to get $660 billion in 2010 to deal with those issues?”