House Journal: Page 1911: Thursday, May 1, 2003
When the freshmen came in here I told them they had two things to do. One, you
had to represent your district and the second is that you had to think. Boy we need
people to think in this place and not just act like a bunch of robots. That is really
important.
I also want to thank my staff; Mark Bransgaard and Carolyn. I can't tell you how
much they helped me by trying to get me through the day and believe me, if I sound
like I know what I am talking about once in a while, it is because they wrote the stuff.
And I appreciate the work of the Republican staff. You have always been very kind
and courteous to me and the members of my caucus. I can't say enough about that, but
I have to say folks, I believe I have the best Democratic caucus staff in the building and
I am biased about that. I really appreciated working with Polly Lipsman and Tom and
Ed and Joe, Mary and Jennifer and Anna, Dean and Dave and my Page, Claire, who
was a great help to us. They helped all the members. And I think that they also
helped a lot of the people on the other side of the aisle too. I hope they were always
receptive to helping folks in the republican caucus, because I know that the Republican
staff members helped us.
There is a new intelligence here now. There is a new life and a new energy here in
the House of Representatives. We came in here with huge tasks. And you know what?
It's easy to take on some of these subjects when times are kind of easy, you know, we
got a lot of money. It is easy to be in politics when you got a lot of money. Especially if
your a Democrat, I can tell you that. Of course I have seen the Republicans spend
money lately in ways I can't believe, but nevertheless, I've always wondered about that
a little bit, but, regardless.
The other thing that I talked about on opening day was I asked the new people to
get to know their neighbors not just as people, not just as legislators. To get to know
them and their needs and their districts and what they came down here to serve. And
I think that has happened. I see Republicans and Democrats talking together time and
time again on all kinds of things here and I think, well, you know, we had some fights.
There will always be differences. I hope there are always differences. There should be
differences. We should be proud of those differences. But, we have accomplished some
good sized things. I kind of wish the folks across the ropes would have worked a little
better with us. Maybe when you go to the Senate, and I don't want to be nasty here,
about the Senate because when I was over there, my goodness, they gave me a
standing ovation and I've made more fun of those guys than anybody else since I've
been here. But I did appreciate it. It was an honor. I think that maybe the Senate
will work with us here on some of the things that we have done. But when the
governor announced that there should be an Iowa values fund in this state, that we
had to change, that we had to risks, I know what that is about. As a person who has
operated his own business and started a couple of others over the last forty years, I
know what risks are all about. And I know they are important. But to really do this
right for the people of the state of Iowa, there could not be just a House Republican
plan, or a House Democratic plan. There had to be a House plan and then we could
turn that into a General Assembly plan, a Iowa plan for the people of the state. And I
think we have accomplished that in the House. I don't think it would have been done
without the help of the people in the majority party to work with us in the minority
party. The two of us getting together, those eight people, by the way, and I want to pay
a special tribute to the eight people, I don't care whether you voted for that thing or
not. There was a tremendous amount of hard work and I respect the people that voted
© 2003 Cornell College and
League of Women Voters of Iowa
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