Hurricanes and Supreme Court nominations appear to have eliminated any chance of Congress considering Social Security reform this year.

September was to be the month in which House Republicans brought Social Security reform to a vote but Hurricane Katrina - and, to a lesser extent, Hurricane Rita - changed that. With lawmakers' attention distracted by the hurricanes' destruction of the Gulf Coast and the widespread criticism of the federal response to Katrina, Social Security reform became a much lower priority. In addition to appropriating recovery funds and investigating the timeliness and efficacy of relief efforts, legislators also must finish work on spending bills, which, in theory, were to have been completed by Sept. 30. On the Senate side, meanwhile, the confirmation of Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and the upcoming confirmation hearings for associate justice nominee Harriet Miers have been added to the workload.

With so much to do in so little time - and so many tens of billions of extra dollars claimed for hurricane relief - Social Security reform probably is unlikely to come up before 2006. And, given the planets that have to align in order for such a divisive issue to be seriously considered, it is not unlikely that no vote on Social Security reform will take place until at least the next presidential administration.