I had earlier concluded that a war with Iraq would be a distraction from the successful and expeditious completion of our aims in Afghanistan. Now I had come to question whether the White House was telling the truth.

I have had national security background, 10 years on the Intelligence Committee, the last two years as chair.

This president has been reluctant to hold anybody accountable. No one was held accountable after September the 11th. Nobody's been held accountable after the clear flaws in intelligence leading up to the war in Iraq.

A significant number of pages and sentences that the administration wants to keep in a classified status have already been released publicly, some of it by public statements of the leadership of the CIA and the FBI.

During the Cold War, we gathered information by listening to the Soviets, taking pictures of the Soviets, and we allowed our human intelligence to decline.

Its fundamentally unfair to have so much of the tax relief go to so few. And it is a 10-year tax plan rather than one, as mine, focused on the next two years, which in my opinion is the critical time to jumpstart the economy.

There is no doubt that . Saddam Hussein has reinvigorated his weapons programs. Reports indicate that biological, chemical and nuclear programs continue apace and may be back to pre-Gulf War status. In addition, Saddam continues to redefine delivery systems and is doubtless using the cover of a licit missile program to develop longer-range missiles that will threaten the United States and our allies.