JOPLIN, Mo. —
Congress returned on Tuesday from an election break. Members — including 12 new to the Senate and some 70 in the House — have plenty on their plate.
The nation’s voters endorsed a Democratic president and Senate, a Republican House. According to the Associated Press, Democrats will hold a 55-45 edge in the Senate if independent Angus King of Maine caucuses with them as expected. Republicans’ advantage in the House narrowed and is likely to stand at 233-201.
Congress has to somehow figure out in the coming weeks how to raise revenues, slash the deficit and address the entitlement programs of Social Security and Medicare. They also have to figure out how to stop across-the-board cuts to defense and domestic programs totaling $110 billion next year.
One longtime Globe reader, Keith Adams, retired chief executive officer of the former Oakhill Hospital, this week introduced an idea to us that makes a lot of sense — new seating assignments.
Members of the House have no assigned seats but are by tradition divided by party; Members of the Democratic Party sit to the House speaker's right and members of the Republican Party sit to the speaker’s left. Members of the Senate are divided by party.
What might happen if, say, 7th District Republican congressman Billy Long from Missouri could decide to sit next to California’s 8th District Democrat congresswoman, Nancy Pelosi?
A little less extreme might be seating Missouri’s two senators, Claire McCaskill, a Democrat, and Roy Blunt, a Republican, by each other.
Adams says he has made the suggestion before. It usually falls on deaf ears. There is a reason, though, that the voters often implore their representatives to “reach across the aisle.” They literally have to make that effort if they want to have a discussion.
America is sick and tired of the deep divide. Adams’ suggestion of seating Congress in alphabetical order makes as much sense as anything we’ve heard in a while.
Opinion
Our View: Long reach
- Opinion
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Our View: Spying on us
Distrust of government secrecy has been elevated to an exceptional level with the disclosure the Justice Department covertly examined two months of Associated Press phone records to determine who leaked details to the AP about a foiled terrorist plot.
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Our View: Pass on the legacy
Forty hungry members of the 1st Kansas Colored Volunteer Infantry began gathering corn at the Rader farm near the village of Sherwood when they were ambushed by a guerrilla band of about 70 Southern sympathizers.
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Our View: Big Brother looms large
The federal government, working under the cloak of secrecy, has been having a heyday at the expense of all Americans.
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Our View: Disgraceful military assault
We want to make one thing clear: A sexual assault is not a sex scandal. Nor can the rise in sexual assaults in the military be justified in any way.
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Elliott Denniston, guest columnist: Right-to-work laws only hurt workers
Middle-class workers have been fighting an uphill battle for the past 30 years.
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Your View: Food drive efforts
Branch No. 366 of the National Association of Letter Carriers along with the National Rural Letter Carriers Association, the American Postal Workers Union and the U.S. Postal Service would like to thank all the area communities that participated in the 2013 Stamp Out Hunger food drive.
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Your View: More about tax credit
The Globe’s editorial in “Our View” (May 10) may have left readers with a few inaccurate impressions.
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Other Views: Sickening disparity
Don’t feel bad if you don’t understand the wide, sometimes huge, discrepancies in fees hospitals charge for the same procedure. Or if you don’t understand the arithmetical magic the hospitals use to arrive at those fees.
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Carol Stark: America in need of more 'momisms'
Several years ago, I attended a writing workshop where one of the sessions was called “Tell it to Mom.”
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Our View: Keep learning
Donna Maus, a biology teacher from St. Mary’s Colgan High School in Pittsburg, Kan., told a group of top students, their parents and their teachers something we think everyone needs to hear.
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