Congress Is Broken--Restore Regular Order

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I was first elected to the US House of Representatives in a special election in September 1977. Were I still in Congress today, I would be senior to every other sitting member of the House. 46 years as a member and as a close observer of the institution leads me to a simple conclusion. Congress is broken. The vision of James Madison enshrined in the U.S. Constitution, the most important document in the world second only to the Bible, has been blurred, distorted, and almost forgotten. Partisanship has eclipsed any thought of working together in the interest of the nation. Party loyalty is sacrosanct and any deviation in either Party is frowned upon and sanctioned. Gone are the days when members of Congress could reach across the aisle to produce legislation founded on common sense rather than sheer Party dogma. “Negotiation” does not equate with “capitulation.” But insistence on “my way or the highway” often yields what we have seen too often in recent years: nothing … or much worse.