Stratford Star

Blumenthal reflects on first year in Senate

Written by Ken Borsuk
Wednesday, 08 February 2012 16:35

A year ago, U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal took the oath of office for his first term in office. What he encountered in his first year was a Congress facing extremely low approval ratings, with the House of Representatives hitting record lows, and frustrating political gridlock. However, he remains optimistic that the representatives will be able to work together to try and create agreement and progress.

Blumenthal, a Greenwich Democrat, sat down recently to reflect on his first year in office, his hopes for the new year in Congress and what, if anything, can be done to stop what he sees as the ideological partisan gridlock that has prevented Republicans from working with Democrats on critical legislation.

While he enjoys his new position after 20 years as Connecticut's attorney general, he admits that it has been a tough road.

A prime example of this was the recent fight over the payroll tax cut. While the Senate was able to reach a bipartisan deal that passed by an 89-10 margin to extend the tax cut, the House blocked it after a segment of Republicans there demanded more concessions from Democrats. While Republicans finally relented and a deal in the House was reached to approve the Senate bill, he said it was all too typical of what is going on in Washington today.

"Even before the latest debacle, my impression is that we really need to come together and compromise on measures like creating jobs and promoting economic growth," he said, adding it appears to be a specific segment of Congress that is holding the legislative body "hostage."

"I hope the American people will see the paralysis for what it is," Blumenthal said. "It's a small minority — you can call them tea party or whatever you want — but it's a small minority holding the House hostage. And that means holding America hostage. They're threatening havoc in the American economy and it's an ideologically driven, extreme view as well as a highly inconsistent one."

Looking for cooperation

Blumenthal said he has introduced measures that he believes will create that economic growth such as the Community College Innovation Act, which provides aid for people to attend community colleges to give them the skills they need for jobs that are both available now and will be in the future. Blumenthal said the act has bipartisan support right now and that he hopes it will be adopted as part of a larger package, but that right now it is being reviewed by the Senate's Health, Education, Labor & Pensions Committee.

He has introduced other measures such as a bill to provide pharmaceutical companies more incentives to develop antibiotics while also streamlining the Food and Drug Administration's regulatory and review process. Blumenthal said he is also calling for a Department of Justice review of drug shortages in hospitals and clinics in Connecticut that he believes puts lives at risk and leads to price gouging.

These are bills with support from his fellow Democrats as well as Republicans, but Blumenthal said again that partisan gridlock has kept bigger measures from being considered.

"I've been frustrated because so much of the top line issues have been dominated by partisan wrangling and friction," Blumenthal said. "My hope is that the controversy over the payroll tax cut and the unemployment insurance extension will help break through that gridlock. We reached a bipartisan agreement on the payroll tax cut that was passed 89-10 and I think it opens the way for other bipartisan agreements in the future on these issues and others."

He said Congress needs to work together on items such as the Pathways Back to Work program which he introduced. It provides for focused aid on unemployed people to provide them with more opportunities, particularly younger people who are unemployed. This and other measures, he said, are on the floor of Congress awaiting a vote.

While Blumenthal has joked about how little power his freshman status in the Senate affords him, he admits there has been a period of adjustment as he learns the legislative process and how to make it work while navigating through the written and unwritten rules as well as the personalities of his colleagues.

"I've tried to carve out areas were I can make a difference like veterans issues, education issues and health care issues where I've proposed specific measures that will benefit Connecticut as well as the country," Blumenthal said. "I am going to fight for Connecticut and the learning experience for me has been on how to focus and every day figure out ways to move the ball forward. Instead of using the court process, I am now learning the legislative process and developing approaches just as I did as attorney general. It took me a while to develop the job of attorney general into what it became after 20 years for me. I am doing the same learning and developing here."

A focus on jobs

Like many of his colleagues, Blumenthal said the focus in the new year must remain on jobs and the economy, but it will take representatives on both sides of the aisle to put aside partisanship for any kind of progress. While there seems to be paralysis in Congress now, Blumenthal has hope. He mentioned Republican friends like Sens. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) as people he disagrees with on many issues that he can work with on important legislation. He said in the Senate there are relationships that cross ideological lines leading to measures like the payroll tax cut extension, which could well be an issue soon again since the three-month extension will expire in March.

Even with the entire House and many of his Senate colleagues up for re-election this year — not to mention with the fight for the White House — Blumenthal says he feels progress can be made and that he will continue to fight for bipartisan cooperation.

A frequent complaint about the Senate has been the inability to get legislation through due to an unprecedented use of the filibuster, which requires a 60 vote threshold to close off debate, setting a higher standards for a vote than the 51-vote margin which for so long had defined majority rule. The Democratic Party's control of the Senate is very much in doubt after this coming election, but even with that in mind, Blumenthal said he supports filibuster reform to keep a minority from blocking legislation supported by a majority.

"My first vote in the Senate was to eliminate the filibuster and end the 60-vote rule," Blumenthal said. "I believe very strongly that we need to make it much more limited if we retain it at all. It used to be applied only to the most extraordinarily important decisions. Now it applies to virtually every vote. That is just wrong. It is a cause of paralysis. No other legislative body in the world, so far as I know, requires 60 votes to do business. It should be changed."

Withdrawal from Afghanistan

Blumenthal is also looking at the biggest problems beyond our borders: Afghanistan and Pakistan. As a member of the Armed Services Committee, a major concern for him has been the roadside bombs being used against U.S. troops in Afghanistan. He has traveled to both Afghanistan and Pakistan and says it is clear that the bombs are being made with fertilizer from Pakistan and the governments are aware of it. As part of a Senate contingent, he urged Pakistani leaders to do more to prevent this but said all they received was a "two-faced answer."

"They told us 'We don't make the fertilizer' and 'It doesn't come from us' and 'We can't do anything about it,'" Blumenthal said. "We have told them there needs to be a plan and they need to implement it. These roadside bombs are causing more than 50% of all our casualties. One of the generals told me that 'A good day for us is when we're ambushed. When we're ambushed we can fight back and when we fight back we can win.' When they're attacked by these bombs, there's no way to fight back. Our soldiers are losing arms and legs because of this."

There is better protective gear that can cut down on the damage of these bombs and help prevent the loss of limbs, but Blumenthal said our troops weren't getting it. So he and his colleagues returned home and were able to meet with the U.S. Department of Defense to get the delivery of the gear accelerated. Now all U.S. troops were supposed to have it by the end of December. Blumenthal has worked with Sen. Bob Casey (D-Penn.) to include a bill in the most recently passed Defense Authorization Act that requires Pakistan to take action on this issue or else face losing its critical aid from America.

Now that U.S. combat troops have officially left Iraq, Blumenthal said it is time to leave Afghanistan as well, a move recently announced.

"We need to continue the draw down and even accelerate it," Blumenthal said. "That's what we're doing and it's both practical and necessary to continue it. I have a son who is there. He was just promoted to first lieutenant in the Marine Corps Reserve and is in command of an infantry focused on training the Afghan security forces. That's what our mission increasingly is in Afghanistan. We're training and equipping the Afghans to defend themselves."

As a member of the Armed Services Committee, he said he will push for areas where there can be savings in spending, like using more fuel efficient power sources in the field that can reduce battlefield and base costs. Blumenthal agrees there needs to be cuts in military spending, just as there has to be in overall government spending, but they have to be "smart cuts." Not surprisingly, those cuts he is looking at will not include spending on submarine construction in Connecticut, which he feels must be preserved.

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