john nichols of "the nation" magazine will have the latest and mike. entonoi on and heidi harris battle over what is class warfare. >> great to have you with us tonight, folks. drunken sailors and president bush finally, is turowed take them on and make them pick up the tab. the president drew this line in the sand this morning. i loved it! >> i will not support -- i will not support any plan that puts all of the burden for closing our deficit on ordinary american, and i will veto any bill that changes benefits for those who rely on medicare, but does not raise serious revenues by asking the wealthiest americans and corporations to pay their fair share. we are not going to have a one-sided deal that hurts the folks who are most vulnerable. >> you know, this is what should have been said during the lame duck session of the congress, but i'll take it now. the president let republicans have what they wanted for the last nine months. you know the bush tax cuts that didn't work. it hasn't create good jobs to their satisfaction. someone needs to pick up the

joining me tonight is john nichols. great to have you with us.t is expected to propose $300 billion in tax cuts and federal spending in the plan on thursday. i'm thinking, that's a great number. but what do you think? is that going to be enough? >> proposing tax cuts and cuts in federal spending is absolutely irrelevant to creating jobs. >> amen. >> it is possible that if you target some tax cuts to businesses that are hiring or do credits to them, that could be helpful. this whole game has got to stop, and this president has got to understand that his job on thursday night is not to talk to the republicans in congress. it is to use that forum to speak to the american people. the american people are hurting. we have almost 10% unemployment, almost -- well, around 16% real unemployment in this country. this president has to say to the american people, i have a plan. i will fight for you, it is not a complicated plan, everybody can understand it. i'm not going to mess it up with all sorts of talk about taxes and spending. i'm going to talk about jo

. >>> let's turn now to john nichols, washington correspondent of the nation. john, what do you think? is this voter suppression? >> it is, ed. in fact, the senate was alerted to this in congress several years ago by senator ron widen and senator john merkley from oregon who said in a letter, this is a serious problem. when you cut back the postal service, you threaten a whole system that is structurally in place in oregon. which, i might add, is a state that generally votes democratic for president and sends two democrats to the u.s. senate. >> so i guess you could say people in rural america could be getting second-class service, maybe treated like second-class citizens. it's going to hurt small business, no doubt. what about journalism, in your opinion? you've worked in small towns many times in your career. what does this do? >> well, remember that the postal service actually delivers a lot of small town weeklys through the mail, and there is a slightly lower rate, and so it makes it easier for the small town weeklies and dailies to stay in business. so this

john brown from florida. kevin houston, united states navy seal from massachusetts. and the last row, mere, byron nichols, chief warrant officer, united states navy guard from kansas. nick class knowl, united states navy seal from west virginia. thomas ratliff, chief petty officer from arkansas. byron bill, united states navy seal from connecticut. and john nugara, first petty officer from nebraska. mr. speaker, these are the men who gave their lives so that others could live. and while we mourn the lives they gave for the rest of us, we should thank the good lord that such men as these lived. the americans, the american breed, the rare breed, the finest we have. and that's just the way it is. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the time of the gentleman has expired. the chair recognizes the gentleman from oregon, mr. blumenauer, for five minutes. mr. blumenauer: mr. speaker, there's been much talk about jobs and economic recovery. sadly more talk than action. today's consideration of extending the surface transportation act and the f.a.a. authorization, both of which have expired, is a positive devel