Kay Bailey Hutchison: “there is a time to talk and there is a time to act. The Senate today has unanimously acted with force, with resolve, and…”

“there is a time to talk and there is a time to act. The Senate today has unanimously acted with force, with resolve, and with unanimity. We spoke for the people of our country about the heinous situation in which we find ourselves, and also about the resolve to keep this from happening again. We have passed a resolution giving the President of the United States our support and authorization for the use of military force against any person or any country that is helping the people who did the despicable acts of September 11. I heard a young woman on television this morning whose brother was lost in one of the World Trade Center Towers. The young woman was asked what she thought the response of the United States should be. She said, ``I don't really want to go to war. I just don't want anyone else to have to suffer what I am suffering today.'' I just want to say to that young woman, and to all of the other families of the victims of September 11, 2001, that it is exactly what we did today that will prevent other people in the future from suffering what she is suffering. If we do not respond with force, we will put American lives in jeopardy, and we will not be doing our job of protecting the people of our country whom we were elected to protect. No one would ever have the United States move before we had absolute evidence about who perpetrated this atrocity, but when we have that evidence, we are going to move.”