The Senate needs problem-solvers

Submitted by Collin Berglund on May 4, 2012
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Daily Dose
richard lugar
peggy noonan
Olympia Snowe
lyndon johnson
reid ribble
scott rigell
jim cooper
kurt schrader
THE SENATE NEEDS PROBLEM-SOLVERS: That's why we're with Peggy Noonan: Sen. Dick Lugar (R-IN) is the stronger candidate in the Indiana Republican Senate primary. "We are as a nation in a moment of real peril, facing challenges that are going to become existential -- maybe already are -- if we don't do something about them ... So right now, and more than ever, we need mature folk involved in our governance, people for whom not everything is new. People who know how to do things, who began studying a complicated issue 25 years ago and have kept up, who know it backward and forward, and who know how to talk across the aisle," Noonan writes. Lugar is just such a leader -- and there aren't enough lawmakers willing to work across the aisle left in Washington: Peggy Noonan for The Wall Street Journal: The Case for Dick Lugar
 
SNOWE WANTS CHANGE FOR CONGRESS: Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME) is retiring -- and her choice is emblematic of a Congress that has changed enormously through the years. When Snowe began, problem-solvers in Congress weren't hard to find. It's time to bring them back: Matthew Cooper for National Journal: Exit Interview
 
THE WAY THINGS USED TO BE: When Lyndon Johnson was president, political scientists didn't worry about gridlock -- they worried about the two parties being too similar. Instead of verbal spats between Democrats and Republicans, arguments took place within each party far more often. The result was a number of coalitions that created legislation that took a number of views into consideration. Re-building these coalitions is essential to avoid stalemate or explosive polarization: Ronald Brownstein for National Journal: LBJ's Era, and Ours
 
ARE THEY CRAZY? Reps. Scott Rigell, Reid Ribble, Jim Cooper and Kurt Schrader are the only members of the Fix Congress Now Caucus in the House. “They’ve got good hearts and are trying to do the right thing,” Cooper said of Congress. “The challenge in Congress is to get Congress to swallow the pill. It’s a bit like veterinary medicine. If the horse won’t swallow the pill, then the medicine won’t do any good.” Strong reforms, that are also doable and can make Congress swallow the pill, like those in our Make Congress Work! action plan, are necessary: Kate Nocera for POLITICO: Freshman do-gooders embrace lonely reform mission
 
WE'VE GOT PROBLEMS -- AND SOLUTIONS, JUST NO WILL: Jamie Dimon, head of JPMorgan Chase, says America's problem isn't that it doesn't know what to do to solve problems -- the Simpson-Bowles deficit-reduction plan is a viable solution to America's soaring debt and deficit, he says. The problem is a lack of political will. The left and right have pushed each other so far apart that they've created unnecessary problems that aren't structural, but political in nature, Dimon says: Agustino Fontevecchia for Forbes: JPMorgan Chief Jamie Dimon Blasts Obama, Asks For Simpson-Bowles Now
 
HIGH FIVE: No Labels is high-fiving New York Mayoral candidate Christine Quinn for taking a rare stand for civility in politics. During a City Hall press conference celebrating the passage of a controversial living wage bill, Quinn was thanking all those who supported the legislation when a member of the crowd yelled an insulting remark about Mayor Bloomberg. The remark caused Quinn to walk out of the press conference. “I feel incredibly strongly that all of us in government have to do everything we can to make sure government is civil and that we engage in a process that is not personal and doesn’t involve things like name calling,” Quinn said. Agreed! No Labels Blog: High-Fiving New York Mayoral Candidate Christine Quinn
 
STAT OF THE DAY: A recent study of presidential ads has indicated that 70 percent of those aired this election cycle were negative, compared to only 9.1 percent at this point last cycle. That's a huge change that reflects the increasing divisiveness in American politics: Sam Stein for The Huffington Post: Negative Ads Dominate 2012 Election, Study Shows
 

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