New U.S. Senate Minority Leader Sees Hope for Bipartisan Progress
by Jim Brown
November 17, 2006
(AgapePress) - - The new U.S. Senate minority leader is optimistic his party can work together with Democrats on major issues facing the nation. However, other Republicans in the Legislature have doubts about whether the GOP will be able to find common ground with Democrats as extreme leftist liberals take the reins of leadership in Congress.Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell was chosen unanimously by his colleagues in the Senate Republican Conference to be their minority leader in Congress. He says he will seek bipartisan progress together with the Democrats rather than work to obstruct their agenda.
"We had an extraordinarily productive first session of this current Congress," McConnell notes. "It slowed down considerably in the last six months because the minority does have the ability to block and blame," he says.
The new Senate minority leader says he does not blame the Democrats for this since the GOP has done the same thing "from time to time as we were in the minority." But now that the election is over, he adds, "the American people have a right to expect us to put that behind us and grapple with some of the serious issues that are confronting us."
An example of something that is "ripe for bipartisan accomplishment," McConnell notes, is the immigration bill. And two other issues, he contends, need to be at the top of Congress's list of priorities.
"I have said before and will say again that everyone in the Senate and many people in America know that the two mega-issues confronting the next generation of Americans, if we don't act, are saving Social Security and saving Medicare," the Kentucky Republican remarks. "There's always a good reason to kick that can down the road," he says, but "I don't think we ought to do that. I think we ought to step up to the plate."
According to McConnell, sometimes good things come out of divided government. For instance, the senator notes, the "Social Security Fix" of 1983 was orchestrated by Republican Ronald Reagan and Democrat Tip O'Neill. But, while he is all for bipartisan compromise, McConnell stresses that "leftish" solutions will not pass the Senate, and they are not what the American people want either.
But another Republican in the U.S. Senate is expecting to see many leftish solutions proposed as the Democrat majority takes over in Congress.
Brownback: 'Conservative' Democrats Will Follow Radical Liberal Leaders
Republican Senator Sam Brownback is among those GOP members in Congress expressing concern that, even though a number of the Democrats elected to the House and Senate claim to espouse moderate or conservative values, the radical liberalism of the Democratic leadership will chart the party's direction.
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Senator Sam Brownback |
Although the November 7 midterm elections brought about several Democrat victories, Brownback insists the vote was by no means a rejection of conservative values by the electorate. He says there are plenty of values voters who remain concerned about protecting life and traditional marriage, but who were simply "overwhelmed" by the issues of Iraq and corruption charges against the Republicans.The lawmaker from Kansas urges fellow GOP members not to stop talking about values but, to the contrary, to start talking about pro-life and pro-family issues with the same passion they exhibit when they talk about tax cuts. "I think we need to talk about marriage and why we are for it and not just use code words -- I'm for 'family values' -- and [expect] that the people will understand it," he asserts.
"We need to say, 'Here is why marriage is important: it's a union of a man and a woman and it's a key place, the best place, for us to raise children -- not the only place, but it's clearly the best place, by all the social data," Brownback says. And Republicans need to address these issues "unapologetically," he insists, rather than do as they have done lately -- that is, to "almost kind of tip-toe and apologize" in defending their pro-family positions.
Meanwhile, Brownback believes those "conservatives" across the aisle should be watched closely. Even though some Democrats have successfully campaigned on their purported conservative values or concern for pro-family issues, he says he doubts many of the Democrats elected on a pro-life, pro-family platform will vote that way while under liberal leadership.
In fact, the conservative senator asserts, now that his liberal counterparts on Capitol Hill have control of Congress, they are likely to make a concerted push for embryonic stem-cell research (ESCR) and human cloning. When the Democrats take power in January, they will probably push the ESCR debate, he says, because they believe it is a key "wedge" issue.
And Brownback predicts these liberals in Congress will also likely claim they are anti-cloning, even though they are for the procedure known as "clone and kill" -- that is, cloning a human being for research purposes and requiring that it be killed within seven to ten days.
Although ESCR proponents claim their interest is in finding cures for disease and saving human lives, the senator notes, scientific research does not support their claim that stem cells derived from human embryos will yield any medical cures in the near future. In fact, he points out, "scientific studies coming out now [find] that embryonic stem cells implanted in lab animals are producing tumors in those animals.
"This is something we've been saying all along would happen from prior experience," Brownback says, "but that's starting to come out in a number of the scientific journals." Yet ESCR supporters continue to ignore the evidence and tout the promise of embryonic stem cells, and the senator expects many liberals in Congress will follow their lead.
And in the meantime, Brownback adds, the American public can expect to see a Democrat-controlled Congress put forth a number of so-called "end-of-life" issues. Regardless of some Democrats' appeal to conservatives during their campaigns, he fully expects to see them fall in line with a pro-abortion, anti-family agenda under Nancy Pelosi's leadership.
Jim Brown, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
