Franken Sworn-in Today, Gets to Work Immediately on Major Issues (video)

7 July 2009 :: J.E. Robertson

In Senator-elect Al Franken’s debut on Capitol Hill, he explained that he sees himself not as the 60th vote for the Democratic majority but as the 2nd senator from the state of Minnesota. He added that “Minnesotans are practical people” and explained why “rational” healthcare, that is available and affordable for all Americans must be a priority, why jobs and an economy that works for working people will be part of his agenda.

Franken concluded, saying: “I am going to work day and night to make sure that our kids have a great future and that America’s best days lay ahead. I’m ready to get to work.” For those who expect Franken’s term in the Senate to be fraught with humor and irony, his opening statements might seem like something of a surprise, welcome or not. The author and former comedian and radio host is clearly focused on the practical issues facing his state and on the work of doing his best to ensure a solid future for his constituents.

Franken will be sworn in today, officially taking his place as the 100th member of the US Senate. He will sit on the Senate Judiciary Committee, which will hold hearings next week for the confirmation of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor. So one of his earliest responsibilities may be one of the most historically resonant of his first year in office. He will also join the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, where Franken may take a leadership role in coordinating the Senate’s version of comprehensive healthcare reform.

Sen. Charles Schumer of New York praised Franken’s arrival as conducive to getting healthcare reform that need not be watered-down. “If you did a consensus within the Democratic Party, you would find the level-playing-field public option to be the answer”, he said. And with 60 votes in the Democratic caucus, Schumer believes that a filibuster can be stopped, even if not every one of the 60 senators blocking a filibuster would support every element of the final legislation.

Sen. Schumer was referring specifically to the “public option”, which he refers to as designed to create a “level playing field”, where patients are not disadvantaged by the sometimes collusive diktats of for-profit insurers. Schumer says the public option must be “strong, national, and available to everyone on day one, to keep the insurance companies honest”. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) is pushing an alternate public option that would be based on a kind of local co-op system. As Schumer notes, “Grassley hasn’t closed the door, but it seems in general that his model of co-op is little co-ops popping up like they do in farm country”.

Schumer and top Democratic members remain skeptical that such a system could be robust enough to counter the immense market clout of private insurers whose programs are out of reach of many working people and provide too little breadth of coverage. Franken is expected to help the Democratic majority push for a strong public option, as he has voiced his intention to back a “rational healthcare system” that is part of an economy that “works for working people”.

Franken will be getting a quick lesson in the methodology of Senate arm-twisting as he sits on the committees that will oversee a Supreme Court confirmation hearing and the hearings on comprehensive national healthcare reform, two of the most contentious issues raising ideological ire on both sides. But Franken appears poised to don the progressive pragmatist chic brought in so effectively by Pres. Obama. Obama has defied critics throughout his career by seeking practical solutions to urgent problems, where opponents expected an ideological hard line.

If Franken —one of the founders of the Air America radio network, which he felt was necessary to diversify the range of views available on talk radio— can effectively demonstrate his credentials as a pragmatist whose aims are less ideological than to do good work for the people of his state, he may be a more important fulcrum of political pressure that is expected, in the major upcoming debates on healthcare, energy, the Supreme Court and education.

When Franken said yesterday he would “work day and night”, he may have been referring to the work he must do already to catch up on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee’s last two weeks of negotiations to produce a Senate version of the universal healthcare reform bill. Pres. Obama has urged Congress to get a final bill to his desk for signing by 15 October, but disagreements over specific provisions of the legislation, which have some conservative Democrats questioning their support, may push back signing healthcare reform into law until later.

The Senate Judiciary Committee has also been reviewing case law and scholarly writings of Sonia Sotomayor for over a month, while Franken arrives just days before hearings begin. Franken’s quip about being the “people’s proxy” —”As someone who will have been in the committee a grand total of six days and isn’t an attorney I kind of see myself fulfilling a certain role for Americans watching the hearings”— has already been cited 273 times in the press. But Franken alerted the press also to the fact that his staff has been in place for some time, and he plans to “hit the ground, if not running, trotting”.

Printer-friendly

Email article

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.

Home Page

Join Us / Sign In

Categories

Archives

No Comments