doomed legislation.

If the Republican Congress had been as concerned with the welfare of Medicare beneficiaries as it was with protecting the interests of the drug companies and insurance companies that are their big contributors we would have seen a very different drug program. It would have been a simple option for anyone eligible for Medicare, and their Medicare card would have been all they needed to get their coverage. Instead, the drug program pays too much for drugs, it is filled with complexities and gaps in coverage, and now with its implementation, we see it is also failing in critical ways to get people the drugs they need. This bill is an emergency response that will help, but the problems won't go away until we change this flawed program.

The routine promotion of condoms through advertising has been stopped by networks who are so hypocritically priggish that they refuse to describe disease control as they promote disease transmission.

We should be doing our utmost to ensure that all are protected against discrimination,

President Bush has handed out some of the country's most difficult and important jobs - leadership positions in public safety and emergency response - to politically well-connected individuals with no experience or qualifications, ... This common sense legislation will end this practice and ensure that public safety is back in the hands of those who are trained and experienced in protecting the public.

Obviously, the involvement of the vice president raises profoundly disturbing questions, ... We need to understand in detail what role Mr. Cheney played in this despicable incident.