The public’s disdain for partisanship and gridlock in Washington is exposed regularly in opinion polls. It’s also readily apparent in my county meetings in Iowa. Whether I speak at a civic group’s event, visit hospitals, schools, and main street businesses or meet with workers on the factory room floor, Iowans are fed up with excuses.
It would be naVve to suggest politics doesn’t come into play during the legislative process. But when politics trumps public policy, voters have every reason to gripe about lawmakers. And I’m sorry to say that in this election year, partisan gamesmanship led by the Senate Majority Leader came first and the people’s business came second.
The legislative graveyard left behind ought to spook Iowans. Major opportunities have been squandered. Thanks to the team currently in charge of the U.S. Senate, important bipartisan priorities were put on ice and lawmakers skated away with a backlog of unfinished business to hit the campaign trail.
After the terrorist attacks a year ago, an all too uncommon sense of bipartisanship and cooperation blanketed the nation’s capital. The first half of the 107th Congress already had gotten off to a positive start. The president’s historic tax relief plan was signed into law, stimulating the economy and giving every income taxpayer a break. As then-chairman of the tax-writing Senate Finance Committee, I helped shepherd through Congress the $1.3 trillion tax relief plan that cut marginal tax rates and also included billions of dollars in tax-advantaged incentives for child care, retirement savings and education. Lawmakers also worked across party lines to pass a landmark education proposal. The "No Child Left Behind Act" is designed to raise the bar on public education and end an era of low expectations.
But then the wheels started coming off the bipartisan engine and important matters of public policy were derailed. In a last gasp of bipartisanship, Congress finally restored trade promotion authority for the president. This key trade policy tool will accelerate U.S. efforts to get the economy moving again. But for the first time since 1974, the Senate failed to pass a budget blueprint for the next fiscal year. Congress adjourned without passing 11 of the 13 annual spending bills. Again, the current leadership team, lead by Senator Tom Daschle, chose to bypass bipartisan legislative initiatives aimed at health care, jobs, the economy, retirement security and corporate greed.
Daschle’s legislative graveyard includes six major bipartisan initiatives I worked tirelessly to advance, including: changes to the unfair Medicare payment formula that shortchanges Iowa hospitals, doctor’s offices, nursing homes and home health care agencies; a new prescription drug benefit for Medicare recipients; a national energy strategy that would create jobs at home, expand production of renewable energy and reduce our dependence on Iraq for oil; improved protections for workers’ pensions; and a crackdown on corporate misconduct and abuse of the federal tax code.
Instead of embracing the opportunity to rise above politics, the Senate Majority Leader has shown he’d rather drive bipartisan coalitions and their legislative products into the ditch. Political advantage was sought at the expense of the public’s interests. Now voters have an important opportunity to respond to that kind of self-serving leadership.
Despite this abdication of responsibility by the leadership, I’ll continue working harder than ever to resuscitate the long list of unfinished business, which also includes the renewal of the six-year-old welfare reform laws and creation of a new Department of Homeland Security. Hopefully, the new Senate in the 108th Congress will stop searching for excuses, get serious about the issues bearing fundamental consequence to American families and get the job done.