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137
BY MARK WARREN
I LLUSTRATI ONS BY PAUL SAHRE
I spoke with ninety members of the
House and Senate about whats gone so wrong in Congress.
Sometimes it got a little emotional.
be earth and hell have nally been satised,
and there is hope for common cause once
again. From many members in both houses
of Congress, I have heard bipartisan loath-
ing for Senator Cruz of Texas. Hardly an era
of good feeling, but its a start.
No one here respects that guy, Congress-
man Kurt Schrader of Oregon, a Democrat, tells
me. And yet he has this great following out-
side the building. And no one respects him in
his own party in the Senate. Its really a trav- s really a trav- s really a trav-
esty, Mark. Its really a travesty.
Not long ago, animated by the public mood
about Congress and its current historic in-
eptitude and extremism, we decided to talk
to members of Congress, from both hous-
es and both parties, to nd out what their
problem was. And they started talking, of-
ten at length and in surprisingly thought-
ful ways, about their jobs. I ended up talk-
ing to ninety membersa third of the Senate, more than a tenth
of the House. They have all been eager to talk, as if they wanted to
get something off their chest. They represent the full ideological
spectrum, and the full orid bouquet of American accents, and an
almost astonishing variety of biography. There are women com-
bat veterans and Hindus and members who take their oath of of-
ce with left hand on the Bhagavad Gitaand all of that is just one
congresswoman, Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii. There are preachers
and physicists and car salesmen and former All-Pro tackles and
civil-rights heroes. There are hard ideologues and conciliators,
partisan warriors and declared independents. Some are voluble,
some are terse, some are jovial and deant, some have just about
had it and seem depressed. Thats what happens when you dont
have meaningful work, says a Democratic congresswoman from
New Mexico, Michelle Lujan Grisham.
But who really cares about the sad plight of members of Congress?
I had $42 million dropped into my 2012 race by outside groups$42
milliona record that will likely be exceeded this year in North Car-
olina, now that the Supreme Court has become almost an arm of cor-
porate America. Im not whining about this, says Sherrod Brown,
Democratic senator from Ohio, because nobody cares about the
problems of people in our position. No whining on the yacht!
Except, of course, that their dilemma is our disaster.
I had initially planned to ask for no more than ten minutes of
their time, basically just to ask them why they were so bad at their
job, but fairly quickly it became obvious that these were going to
be richer and deeper conversations than I had bargained for. And
along the way, something unexpected happened: I became less
angry and more sympathetic to the thresher that all of these peo-
ple nd themselves caught in. They are not whining. They are cry-
ing for help. After only a few interviews, I stopped asking, Why
are you so bad at your job? because it occurred to me that it was
a cheap question, the kind of question thats not interested in an
answer, which is just the sort of cultural deformity that got us into
this mess. Its a terrible job, being in Congress in 2014.
Its become shirts versus skins far too often, says Republican
senator Jeff Flake of Arizona. A couple of years ago, I got invited
to play basketball with the president, myself and nine other House
members. And I was in the White House in the basement lacing up
my shoes, and I got a call on my cell phone. Somehow somebody
patched it through, and it was a woman from Arizona, a constitu-
ent, crying hysterically. Dont play basketball with that man! she
said. Its become terrible. It really has.
To read extended interviews with members of Congress, scan here with Esquire2.
I
F
didnt get elected to Congress to
not get things donemost peo-
ple here want to get things done.
I didnt get elected to Congress to
make meaningless speeches on
C-SPAN and tell lies about people. I didnt
get elected to Congress to scare the hell
out of the country and drive the sides fur-
ther apart. I didnt get elected to Congress
because I love politicsI hate politics, to
be perfectly honest, and if I didnt before I
got here, I do now....
The man is very angry, about the way his life is going, about Wash-
ington, about some things he has found himself saying that he wishes
he could take backhe got carried away, total herd mentality, just so
juvenile. People in public life should take stuff back more often, apol-
ogize more, and correct course morenow that would be making a
real statement, maybe even be a breath of fresh air for the public. But
he would just be screwing himself, he goes on, because those guys at
Heritage Action or Club for Growth or Americans for Prosperity or
some other goddamn group with an Orwellian name that thrives off
of division and exists to create conict might primary him, drop $3
million on his head, and he would be dead. And the way his district is
drawn, you cant ever be conservative enough. He could get up at one
of his town halls and say that the president is a transvestite Muslim
from Mars and get a standing ovation. He wants to do the right thing
and make a public stand for greater decency and civility in public life.
But he cant. Oh, in his own quiet way he does. He has many friends
who happen to be Democrats. No matter what it seems, we dont
hate each other, he says. We are civil, we try to get to know each
other, and most of us work hard to nd areas of agreement, things
that we can make progress on. People are stunned when I tell them
that, because from the outside it just looks so bad.
At the same time, its worse than he thought it would be before
he was elected, the congressman says. Hes a Reagan Republican.
Nobody drew more lines in the sand than Reagan, nobody was more
of a partisan warrior, but Reagan didnt believe insane things about
the opposition, and there wasnt this unconscionable amount of
money in the system back then. Bribery wasnt legal yet, he says.
His voice is gruff but surprisingly gentle. I always believe things
are going to get better, he says. Hey, look. Its been worse. I mean,
we are not caning each other on the House oor. That has been done.
There is plenty of blame to go around, he saysthe Democrats in
the Senate, for instance, what a disasterbut there is only one guy
this conservative Republican congressman does acknowledge en-
mity for by name, and its not Harry Reid or Barack Obama. If you
talk to Ted Cruz, he says, tell him to stay on his side of the Capi-
tol. We have enough problems without that idiot coming over here
and screwing things up.

FOOLS ARE NOTHING NEW. There have always been
fools, and rancorous factionalism, too. What is new in
this part of history that we are living through is that we
have been taken hostage by them and by the heroes of
the Constitution and various other charlatans. But may-

139
WERE GONNA DO EXACTLY
TO YOU WHAT YOURE DOING TO US,
CHRIS COONS TOLD MARCO RUBIO.
W
A
and he faced a primary this year, and I said, Good Lord, man, what
are they gonna charge you with? And he said: Being reasonable.
Our Venn diagram, says Derek Kilmer, Democrat of Washing-
ton State, is two circles, miles apart. Just after we got here, a group
of us, Democrats and Republicans, were at a burger joint talking,
and after about forty-ve minutes, I said, We have to be able to get
our act together and gure some of these things out. And across the
table, one of my colleagues said, Derek, I like you, but you have to
understand that I won my seat by defeating a Republican incumbent
in my primary, and I campaigned against him for not being conser-
vative enough. The rst vote I cast when I got here was against John
Boehner for Speaker, and I put out a press release that I had voted
against him because he was too compromising. I like you, but I have
zero interest in compromising with you or anybody else. My con-
stituents didnt send me here to work with you; they sent me here
to stop you. I left there and called my wife and said, Oh, my God!
Were seeing the political equivalent of segregation going on in
the country, says Republican Tom Cole of Oklahoma.
AND AS EVER, THAT SEGREGATION makes it ex-
traordinarily difcult to form trusting relationships that
make working together possible. It incentivizes hyper-
partisanship and punishes compromise. But all the same,
the great majority of members interviewed said that the most reward-
ing work they ever did in Congress was in nding points of agree-
ment with a congressman or senator from the other party, working
to forge legislation that bridged the usual divides. But nobody cares
about that stuff, says Republican congressman Morgan Grifth
from Virginia. News ash: People are getting along, compromis-
ing, doing their jobs like adults doesnt have the sizzle of conict
that the media demands in order to hold your interest. I have good
relationships with several Democrats, and last year Diana DeGette
[Democrat of Colorado], Gene Green [Democrat of Texas], and I in-
troduced an important compounding-pharmacy bill to help prevent
disease outbreaks. It really matters. And gets very little attention.
Conict media. Many of them argued that because conict is re-
warded with attention, more actual conict is fostered, which is then
amplied by social media, which blasts powerful narratives at mem-
bers around the clockwho cares if theyre true?largely obscuring
their meek attempts to actually get something done. All of that drives
what most members think of as a perception gap between the way
things are and the way they seem to be. The twenty-four-hour news
cycle was mentioned by nearly every one of the members I inter-
viewed as something that makes their lives hell and, more important,
makes governing very hard. Its the coliseum, says Joaquin Castro,
Democrat of Texas. And in the coliseum, people get hurt for sport.
By some measures I am the most liberal member of the House,
says Representative Donna Edwards, Democrat of Maryland. Im
the ranking member on the Space Subcommittee of the Science Com-
mittee, and Steve Palazzo, a very conservative member from Missis-
sippi, is the subcommittee chairman. We were reauthorizing NASA
and the committee chairman just did his bill, and then there was a
party-line vote and only the amendments that he wanted were ac-
cepted, and that was going to be it. But I called Steve and said, Can
we meet for coffee? We sat down and I said, This is ridiculous that
a bill reauthorizing NASA has to be like a party-line bill. And so the
two of us just completely, you know, separate from our chairman,
WHY HAS IT BECOME SO TERRIBLE? Why, if so many members
believe that things have gone so wrong, cant they just x it? There
are reasons, they say, forces brought to bear that are beyond their
control, and these symptoms of their current malaise are all related
in a complex syndrome. In conversation after conversation, con-
gressmen and congresswomen opened up and talked about each
of these realities, regardless of party or ideology.
You know, if I had a magic wand, one thing I would love to
changewhich you cant do unless youre kingis the redistrict-
ing process by which our boundaries are drawn, says Republican
Aaron Schock of Illinois. Because what has happened over the de-
cades is he who controls the mapmaking process, you know, cre-
ates hyperpartisan districts. And you get more and more members
who come out here and say, Gee, I know that I want to accomplish
something on this issue. I want to take action on this issue, but the
base of my district is so far to the right or to the left it makes it dif-
cult for us to negotiate to the center. But whether youre the most
conservative member or youre the most liberal member, if you
have half a brain, you recognize youre not going to get everything,
and that any successful legislation requires the art of negotiation.
With the way we draw districts, with so few competitive dis-
tricts, weve bifurcated ourselves as a civilization, says Republi-
can Scott Rigell of Virginia. We get one ticket to the State of the
Union, for the gallery, and my wife attends. And this year I came
home from the speech, and she said, Scott, Im just struck by this,
that the Republican side is just all white. And then you look over on
the Democratic side, andand it really doesnt look like America, ei-
ther, you know? Its disproportionately represented the other way.
The Democratic conference in the House looks like America,
says Democrat John Lewis of Georgia, who left his blood on the
Edmund Pettus Bridge on the march from Selma to Montgomery
in 1965, and now regularly takes bipartisan groups to civil-rights
landmarks to educate his colleagues in nonviolent conict-reso-
lution techniques he learned during that period of national up-
heaval. The country is changing, Lewis says, and change makes
some people uncomfortable. But our congressional districts dont
reect that change, and there are so few competitive districts re-
maining that people only ght for or speak up or speak out for the
narrow base of people who reelect them.
James Clyburn of South Carolina points out, There are seven
people who make up the House delegation from South Carolina.
Seven. Of that seven, ones a Democrat, and thats me. Of that seven,
one is black, and thats me. Forty-four percent of the electorate is
Democratic, yet we get one Democrat in Congress. Twenty-nine
percent of the state is black, and yet we get one black in the House.
When you have these one-party districts, the only election is in
the primary, and the winner of the primary will be the one who is
closer to the views of the narrowest base, says Angus King, Inde-
pendent senator from Maine. You cant be moderate. Who votes
in primaries? You have a 10 percent turnout in a primary election
in Georgia, and Republicans are 30 percent of the population. So
10 percent of 30 percentthats 3 percent of the population voting
to choose the nominee, and then if its a multiperson race, and the
winner gets 35 percent, thats one third of 3 percent1 percent of
the population chooses the nominee, who in a gerry-
mandered district will be the eventual member of
Congress. That is bizarre, and it has completely po-
larized Congress. In the primary system that we have
now, there is no upside for a Republican to be reason-
able. I have a friend who is a very conservative senator,
M
140 E S QU I R E NOV E MB E R 2 0 1 4
went back to the drawing board and started working on trying to re-
solve some of the issues that we had. We had no idea how it would
work, but we were able to work through those, and then later in the
process we involved the chairman and the ranking member. The
four of us came up with a bill that we were able to move out of sub-
committee, then out of committee, then it went to the oor, where
I think we only had two Republicans who voted against it. Thats
what should happen with every single piece of legislation that we
do. When you remove the opportunities for members of Congress
to work with their colleagues, then theres no question that things
are going to break down along purely partisan lines. So I just picked
up the phone.
Working with members of the other party, on legislation that
matters, is the way I keep my sanity, says Erik Paulsen, Republi-
can of Minnesota. With Karen Bass [Democrat of California] and
Louise Slaughter [Democrat of New York], we worked on sex-traf-
cking legislation that just went to the presidents desk.
The thing that allowed me to connect with Marco Rubio was a
night in 2011 that the two of us are sitting there, in the back of the
chamber, says Delaware Democratic senator Chris Coons. This
was a night where it was justit was just an awful argument.
And he kinda looked at me and I looked at him, and I said, I guess
were here all night. And he says, You know, thisll all get better.
And I said, What do you mean? And he says, Well, after the elec-
tion. I said, Really. Really? You think its gonna change after the
election? He goes, Yeah! I said, Cause somehow President Rom-
ney and you guys being in the majority is magically gonna change all
this? I said, Were gonna do exactly to you what youre doing to us.
And were gonna hold you here as many nights as youre holding us.
And he looks at me and hes like, Thats depressing. I said, No, its
reality. We gotta learn to work together. And he looks at me and he
says, Have you ever even read Governor Romneys economic plan?
I said, No. Have you read President Obamas? He looks at me and
says, Does he even have one? Im like, Marco! You know, look, can
we go downstairs? So we go down to the inner-sanctum thing where,
you know, its only senators and you can have a drinknot that he
had a drinkand I said, Marco. Why dont we try this? Ill have my
economic guy sit down with your economic guy, and lets see what
we can do. Cause we ought to be able to agree on something. And
both of us, our respective political
handlers thought it was a terrible
idea, you know, What? That guy?
But we ended up nding ve ideas
that each of us were perfectly hap-
py putting our names to and would
be very good for the country. We
came up with some silly acronym
something that spells AGREEand
introduced it.

MAKING THOSE POLICY rela-
tionships harder still is the fact that most members of Congress just
dont know one another anymore. When Newt Gingrich rose to the
speakership after the 1994 election, he urged his mem-
bers to leave their families at home in their districts as
a statement against Washington, thus shortening the
congressional workweek, keeping people constantly
running either to or from the airport, and preventing
anybody from developing the relationships that make
governing possible.
Im always running back and forth to the district,
says Gene Green, Democrat from Texas. But since
Helen moved up hereshe retired from teaching in
03shes gotten to know a number of wives. In fact, she helps lead
a Bible study for congressional spouses every Wednesday. Theres
only a couple of Democrats who attend. Helen jokes she goes to
make sure theyre not praying against us. But there is a very con-
servative Republican from northern Mississippi named Alan Nun-
nelee. Helen came home from the prayer meeting one day not long
ago and said that Alans wife says he has a tumor on the brain and
had been told he needs to come to MD Anderson in Houston. And
well, I didnt know the guy, but I do a lot of work with MD Ander-
son, and here was this other human being, and he needed help
quickly. And when he was in the hospital, Helen and I went out
there two or three times to see him. Now, I have never voted like
Alan, but in Washington we do not often enough look on each oth-
er as fellow human beings.
When I rst came to the Senate, people in both parties went out
of their way to have personal relationships, says Senator Patrick
Leahy, Democrat of Vermont. I remember being there for about
a few months and Hubert Humphrey said, Have you been to Mos-
cow? Well, no, I said. And he said, I want you and Marcelle to
come. And I didnt have any money, I was at broke, and I blurted
out, What do you suppose the airfare is to Moscow? And he said,
No, were gonna take Jerrys plane. And I said, Jerry who? And
he said, Jerry Ford. Hes the president. Dont you read the papers?
Humphrey led the delegation. His Republican counterpart, Hugh
Scott, the Republican leader, came also. There were other senior
and junior senators from both parties. I had just turned thirty-ve,
and I was with this group representing my country. And we would
build relationships, talk about where our kids went to school, the
vital business of daily life, which then enabled us to work togeth-
er on the vital business of the United States. Those relationships
dont happen so much anymore.
And any spare moment that in the past may have been used to
build trust between the members of Congress is now spent begging
for money, particularly since the Citizens United Supreme Court
ruling, which permitted unlimited spending by corporations or as-
sociations in support of political candidates. And its not just front
line membersthose in tightly contested districtswho have to
spend their allotment of hours per week at the call center, work-
ing donors. Its everybody. Some members report having to spend
thirty hours a week on fundraising alone.
When you look at the cost of a House seat nowwhich is about
$1.6 million or somethingyouve got to raise that money, says
Donna Edwards. And particularly for our candidates and for in-
cumbent members who are in these really tough districts. I mean
theyve got to raise double or triple that to win their seat. And they
have to do it every two years. Its a never-ending hustle. You get
elected to this august body to x problems, and for the privilege,
you nd yourself on the phone in a cubicle, dialing for dollars.
And as if that werent bad enough . . .
Theres an entire industry in Washington that makes money on
conict, says Republican Adam Kinzinger of Illinois. Some of these
outside groupsyou know, your Club for Growth types, and your
Heritage Action, and your FreedomWorksthey go out and they
ITS A NEVER-ENDING HUSTLE,
SAYS DONNA EDWARDS. YOU GET
ELECTED TO THIS AUGUST BODY
TO FIX PROBLEMS, AND FOR THE
PRIVILEGE, YOU FIND YOURSELF IN
A CUBICLE, DIALING FOR DOLLARS.
I
141
THE PARTIES HAVE SET UP A
SYSTEM OF SLANDER AND
MISTRUST, SAYS REID RIBBLE.
AND THEN YOU GET HERE AND
YOURE SUPPOSED TO MAKE
NICE RIGHT AWAY.
fund raise by saying that Republicans arent sufciently conservative.
Or they pick an issue to go to war on because they can stir the base
and raise money on it and pay their big salaries. And what that does
in the long run is it takes what would be a solid Republican agenda
and causes chaos. And they do the same thing on the Democrat side,
you know? If Democrats want to reach out and work with Republi-
cans, you have these groups that will stir the base and say, If theyre
working with Republicans, theyre capitulating. So theres a very
destructive cottage industry that exists on Hey, we can raise nice
salaries for ourselves by just raising peoples ire with Washington.
As for the outside money: Theres a phalanx of extremists on
the Republican side who, in a better world, would be a rump group
who sensible people ignored as we went about the business of gov-
erning, says Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat of Rhode
Island. And youd be able to forge bipartisan coalitions on major
issues, and the extremists would be relegated to hopping up and
down in the back benches. Thats been a political phenomenon
in parliaments and legislatures, you know, through history. But
here, those extremists control or represent a great deal of mon-
ey, an enormous amount of political threat that can be brought to
bear against their own colleagues. Thats where the outside mon-
ey comes in. If youre just a plain conservative Republican and not
an extreme Tea Partyite, you are very anxious about the combina-
tion of the Koch brothers producing a candidate who has untold
millions of dollars in outside money coming in for him, in your pri-
mary, while the right-wing TV and radio echo chamber suddenly
tees off on you, out of the clear blue sky. And then youve got Rush
Limbaugh and Ann Coulter vilifying you. And the next thing you
know, youre all done. And its not the merits of their ideas, it is not
the appeal of their personalitiesit is the raw political weight of
Citizens United money.
On all of thatthe crippling effects of the money, the empowered
extremes, the outside pressuresthere is general agreement among
the scores of legislators I spoke to. But that is where agreement ends.
IN TALKING TO SO many mem-
bers of Congress, you discover
many things. You discover, for
instance, that Congressman
Cedric Richmond, Democrat of
Louisiana, has an eighty-mile-
an-hour fastball, and that last
year he shut out the Republi-
cans in the Congressional Baseball Game
220. This year at Nationals Park, Rich-
mond showed mercy and beat them by on-
ly 156. I was out of practice, he says.
You also discover anguish and anger, a sur-
prising candor, a deep degree of thoughtful-
ness, a great deal of humor. This comes as
something of a surprise, given the dimmer
lights who so often represent their institu-
tion on TV. You wonder if you might be peel-
ing each member off the herd one at a time,
the act of isolation itself shocking them into
reasonableness, only to then have them re-
turn to the mania of their respective mobs.
You discover new terms at the heart of
the conict, like messaging bills, which
the House has passed in the hundreds but
are purely political documents, meant to
satiate the base but worthless as policy and
to the public; and lling the tree, which
sounds poetic and bountiful but is instead
toxic, as it refers to the prerogative of the
majority leader in the Senate to ll up the
amendment tree, thus preventing any-
body else from offering amendments of
any kind; and regular order, which ev-
eryone claims to want restored, but which
no one can dene.
You also discover the broad embarrass-
ment and anger among members of both par-
ties that the public might associate them with
the antics of people like Senator Ted Cruz
and Republican congressmen Louie Gohmert and Steve Kingav-
atars of a conict that is deep and real, but also agitators in favor of
dysfunction. Member after member fumed to me about those who
measure success in terms of how many things they can stop, how
much disruption they can sow, how much ill will they can foster,
and how that ill will, lapped up by an eager press, is self-perpetuat-
ing. If you dont want to legislate, maybe you shouldnt run for the
legislature, says Congressman Tom Cole of Oklahoma.
You discover that the toxicity in the partisanship is owing to the
president (Leonard Lance, R-New Jersey), the president (Mick
Mulvaney, R-South Carolina), the president (Marsha Blackburn,
R-Tennessee), and You have to include the presidents race in the
equation, (Senator Debbie Stabenow, D-Michigan), Some of it is
race (Gene Green, D-Texas), We have an African-American presi-
dent (Joyce Beatty, D-Ohio). I have come to this conclusion, says
Beatty, because no one else can offer me another answer.
And you discover that the underlying institutional conicts rage
on unceasingly.
Ninety percent of the good days I have are good days because
I have a good attitude, and 90 percent of the bad days I have are
when I have a bad attitude. And right now, 100 percent of the Senate
days, people have a bad attitude, says Republican senator Johnny
Isakson of Georgia. And that is caused in large measure because
of the nuclear option that Harry Reid exercised [changing Senate
rules to allow simple-majority votes on judicial nominees and ex-
ecutive-branch appointments, and removing the opportunity for
libusters in those cases]. And also mischaracterization of things
like the libuster. To merely refuse to vote for cloture and protract
debate does not mean youre libustering a nominee or an amend-
ment or a legislation. That got repeated in the reporting to where
everybody thought we were down there holding everybody up. We
werent holding everybody up.
I feel like the rule change was the best thing for the country, and
the best thing for the Senate, and it should have been done a long
time ago, says Tim Kaine, Democratic senator of Virginia. The
framers didnt intend for approval of presidential nominees to be
by a supermajority vote, or they would have put it in the Constitu-
tion, which they did for certain kinds of votes, like treaty ratica-
tions. But the Senate rules were being abused to turn every nom-
ination into a supermajority vote. A president was elected. That
president should have the popular mandate to assemble a lead-
ership team, but there was, really, the nullication of laws going
on. . . . We dont like the National Labor Relations Board, but we cant
muster the votes to destroy it, so lets just not put people on it. We are
worried about what lling judicial vacancies might meanwe got
to ll up a lot of people, we dont want the Democrats to be able to
but we cant change the law about the number of judges on the D. C.
Circuit, so well just block every nominee. We have donors who hate
the idea that the federal government is involved in the housing in-
dustry, but if we put in a bill to destroy the FHFA, or Fannie or Fred-
die, the real estate industry will say, Youre crazy! so we just wont
approve a new head of the FHFA. We were never wild about Med-
icaid and Medicare, so we wont approve a CMS administrator for
six and a half years! There was an effort by Republicans to destroy
programs of governmentthat they could not defund or legally
eliminateby not approving appointees, in a way that was com-
pletely contrary to the law.
Republicans are not going to put up with it! Were sick of it!
says Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah. The Senate has emasculat-
ed itself and put us at the whim of what is, in my view, a political-
ly destructive president. Let me tell you, when the Republicans
take back the Senate, the Democrats will need to be taught a les-
son. They will regret changing the rules. Some more senior mem-
bers already do. And then Harry lls the tree and doesnt allow
amendments? Because he doesnt want his members to take dif-
cult votes? Thats why were here, to take tough votes! And why
doesnt he bring up any of the more than 350 bills that have passed
the House, most of which passed with bipartisan support? Theyre
all sitting on Harry Reids desk.
They can do 364 bills, they can do 3,640 bills, and its all just
partisan sausage cranking, says Senator Sheldon Whitehouse,
Democrat of Rhode Island. Theres good reason that we dont
waste our time picking all that stuff up. It hasnt gone through the
basic work of bipartisanship that is a requirement in the Senate.
Thats hogwash, says Utah Republican Jason Chaffetz. I had
two bills pass unanimously. Its hard to get more bipartisan than
that! Thats just a smokescreen to keep the Sen-
ate from having to make votes. How do we x this?
Vote!
All those bills the House passed? says Pete Gal-
lego, Democrat of Texas. Well, weve gotten pretty
good at naming post ofces.
I think Harry Reid is probably the worst thing
that has ever happened to the institution of Con-
gress, says Idaho Republican Ral Labrador.
Every morning, John Boehner wakes up and he asks himself
a question: Am I going to be Speaker of the Tea Party today, or
am I going to be Speaker of the House of Representatives? says
Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio. If hes going to be Speaker of
the Tea Party, theres going to be no chance for any kind of main-
stream, bipartisan movement forward on almost any issue. If hes
going to be Speaker of the House, he can almost always put a ma-
jority together with a number of people from both parties, and
get something done.
There isnt a Democratic senator of long standing who was en-
thusiastic about the rule change. You can check your notes, and it is
those senators who just got here who demanded it, says Republi-
can senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma. The Senate is injured se-
verely, because once you decide to break the rules, then no rules
have impact anymore. Those senators who have more experience
understand that.
Harry Reid had no choice, says Senator Stabenow, who has been
in the Senate since 2001. I voted to give President Bush his leader-
ship team. The same respect has never been offered this president.
Its simple. The president deserves to have his nominees voted
on, says Ron Wyden, Democrat of Oregon, in the Senate since 1996.
I had opposed the rules change in years past, but supported it this
time because in all my time I had never seen anything like this ob-
struction, says Patrick Leahy of Vermont, in the Senate since 1975.
Its pretty easy for us to put the blame on Harry Reid and say, Ya
know, Harry lls the tree and doesnt give us any amendments and
by God, were gonna put all the blame on him! says Republican sen-
ator Saxby Chambliss of Georgia. But the fact of the matter is, too,
that we have some folks who are bound and determined to come
up with some wild and crazy amendments that are intended to be
purely political amendments rather than doing the business we
were sent here to do in a very serious way.
142 E S QU I R E N OV E MB E R 2 0 1 4
[continued on page 174]
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THE CONGRESSIONAL LEADERSHIP
ON BOTH SIDES, I MEAN, THOSE
GUYS DONT LEGISLATE ANYMORE,
SAYS TOM COLE. THEY PLOT.
There was a meeting of the Democrat-
ic caucus, says Senator King, the Indepen-
dent from Maine, and several members
were saying, Lets just vote. Lets allow the
amendments, well vote on them, and well
move on. And a member who is up for re-
election in 14 made a pretty powerful point.
He said, I dont mind making hard votes,
but not if the Republicans are going to turn
around and libuster the bill anyway, so its
all for naught. And I thought that was a per-
suasive argument. If youre gonna be forced
to vote on one of these crazy gotcha amend-
mentsViagra for sex offenders or whatev-
erthen there oughta be some purpose. If
no Republicans are gonna vote for cloture
and the bills not gonna pass anyway, then
whats the point?
Part of the reason that certain groups
and the cable shows xate on something like
Benghazi is that we arent offering much else
for them to talk about, says Jeff Flake of Ar-
izona. When you go through regular or-
der, youve got twelve appropriations bills to
pass, each of which funds a different agency.
Theres a lot to talk about. Theres a lot to ll
the void that currently exists. And so I think
if we get back to regular order, allow legis-
lation to be debated on the oor, then well
ll the void that others will ll if we dont.
All these institutional grievances
changed rules, broken traditions, oppressive
majorities, abused libustershave their cur-
rent tap roots in the poisons of outside pres-
sure and empowered extremism.
In response to that, you discover, all sorts
of formal and informal groups are breaking
out, in both houses, to try to make things bet-
ter, because people are sick of this shit, as
one senator told me. The Problem Solvers,
the Future Caucus, the Civility Caucus, the
Gang of 14, the Gang of 12, the Gang of 6.
The twenty women in the Senate have a bi-
partisan dinner once a month to talk about
what jerks the men are. And the members of
the massive freshman class in the House
more than seventy rst-term members
have resolved to maintain bipartisan class
cohesion, hold social and policy events, and
keep a conversation going, even when Mom
and Dad are ghting. In a sign of faith that
the dynamics can change, six members of
the class, including Luke Messer of Indi-
ana, the Republican class president, have
moved their families to Washington.
As a group, the freshmen seem very serious
about this effort to change things, although a
couple of them tell me they are skeptical, in-
different, or consider it to be a waste of time.
Well, you cant just leave me hanging,
says Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard of Ha-
waii, a Democrat. You have to tell me who!
And then she guesses. Tom Cotton. Cotton
is running for the Senate in Arkansas and is
known for his sharp elbows.
No, I say. I actually just spoke to one of
them, a Democrat.
Help . . .
174 E S QU I R E N OV E MB E R 2 0 1 4
[continued from page 142]
Alan Grayson! she says.
How did you know?
Everybody knows, Gabbard says. It was
either going to be Cotton or Grayson.
Others agree. When a Grayson amend-
ment comes up on the oor, says a Demo-
cratic member of the class, Ill ask colleagues
what its about, and theyll just say, Its Gray-
son. Im voting against it.
Theyre assholes, says another. The
Asshole Caucus.
Grayson, an aggressively partisan Demo-
crat from Florida, dismisses the freshman-
class effort at comity as window dressing.
This class has gotten nothing done.
By now, the conversations have taken on a
therapeutic air. Whats everybody saying?
members will ask. Whats the verdict?
And to properly answer that question, you
discover that you have learned something
about the laws of contradiction. Because with
very few exceptions, everything the mem-
bers of Congress have saidcomplaints, ac-
cusations, warnings, and critiquesis true.
Which is not to say that everybody is equal-
ly to blame, because thats an abdication of
reasoning and just silly. It is, rather, to say
that some truths obtain more than others, and
some factors carry more weight. And the re-
current citing by members of those who come
not to talk but to silence, not to compromise
but to attackwhatever insult or injury they
may feelis damning.
And when you talk to this many mem-
bers of Congress, you discover from ma-
ny of them what can only be described as
a yearning for humility and civility. I have
two lovely ofces in the Capitol, says Sen-
ator Leahy. One is very ornate, and huge,
with a large conference table, and I can bring
senators there, with no staff, and we sit and
talk. Thats where the immigration bill hap-
pened. My other ofce has a balcony over-
looking the Mall. And there Ill have Prayer
Hour and Holy Water, as we call it. One sena-
tor was invited for Prayer Hour, and he said,
You know, Im Jewish. And I said, Weve
got twelve-year-old and single-malt ho-
ly water. And he said, Oh! Well, thats ko-
sher. I can come.
Leahy has been in the U. S. Senate for for-
ty years and is known by all to be an expert
legislator and reliable negotiating partner.
He names some of the giantsDemocrats,
Republicanswith whom he has served.
Everett Dirksen. Mike Manseld. Howard
Baker. George Mitchell. Bob Dole. Boy, in
those days, youd have never dreamed of giv-
ing your word and not keeping it, he says,
his voice trailing off. Never dreamed . . .
And with that, a nal discovery: When
you talk to so many members of Congress,
you realize that those who are widely re-
viled can do much more damage than those
who are widely respected can do good, and
with half the effort.
Help . . .
176 E S QU I R E N OV E MB E R 2 0 1 4

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