Ted Kennedy: What a Difference an Election Makes

[maddezmom]

Rome wasn't built in a day, but if this new Congress had been its architect, it might have been. It has been just 66 days since Congress changed hands, and already the results are remarkable. In my 45 years in Congress, I have never seen the Senate turn so rapidly from stalemate toward real progress. While the daily media focus may be on our internal debates or the next presidential election, the biggest news of 2007 is that the election mattered and that the Democrats have already delivered for the American people.

The biggest reason is that the election replaced a do-nothing Congress with the kind of Congress that our Founding Fathers intended: an equal branch of government that takes seriously its responsibility to exercise oversight over the executive branch and to legislate in the public interest. The progress of the past few months only underscores how much our country has needed an active and alert Congress. The examples are numerous.

Last week, the Senate and the House held hearings on the inexcusable conditions at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. We have a lot of work to do to keep faith with our wounded soldiers. But it took a Democratic Congress to uncover what had been concealed by the do-nothing Republican Congress -- that this administration has been warehousing instead of rehabilitating wounded soldiers who return from Iraq and Afghanistan.

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Just last week, the Senate Judiciary Committee provided a forum for U.S. attorneys who were fired for political reasons. The Justice Department initially pretended these firings were based on performance, and it threatened the U.S. attorneys who tried to set the record straight. Hearings called by the Democratic Congress were the difference between uncovering the truth and sweeping it under the rug. The testimony of these Bush appointees made clear that the Justice Department had been caught playing partisan politics -- and then trying to cover its tracks. Because Congress exposed the truth, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales reversed course and agreed that the president should seek Senate approval for any new U.S. attorneys.

more:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/09/AR2007030901837.html