David Thomas: “as we continue to mourn the victims and as the rescue operation turns to recovery, one of the things that I think the…”

“as we continue to mourn the victims and as the rescue operation turns to recovery, one of the things that I think the American people perceived fairly early, and that its elected leaders are beginning to come to consensus on, is that this was an act of war. Although we have not formally declared war, I believe the mental framework of dealing in a wartime situation is one that will serve this country well, one, in terms of pursuing the perpetrators as combatants in a war and using military rules of engagement, but, secondly, on the home front, understanding that what occurred in New York and what occurred in the Pentagon and, to a lesser extent, in Pennsylvania were acts of war. It would be ironic if we did not have this bill in front of us today, because what this bill basically does is take those provisions of the Tax Code already on the books which apply to the military and combat zones overseas or to private citizens who are attacked or are the subjects of terrorist attacks overseas and say, clearly, New York, the Pentagon, the Washington area, were combat zones, and that, therefore, it seems entirely appropriate that those provisions of the Tax Code which relieve tax responsibilities for individuals meeting a profile overseas ought to be brought here to our shores, and that, not just figuratively but literally in the Tax Code, the terrorist victims should be considered as though they were in a combat zone, which they were, and that they were subject to terror…”