The First 100 Hours

There are times when the people of this great nation need and demand things of this government that politics make it impossible to accomplish. This has been the case far too often throughout the last 12 years. Through the last election, the people of this nation have demanded that this government reexamine and change our priorities and our direction. The people have asked us to respond to their hopes and their dreams and their needs. They have asked us to realize that there are good citizens of this nation, honest people who work hard and play by the rules and who nonetheless struggle and live in poverty and toil in object security through no fault of their own. The people have called us to recognize the equality of opportunity. The basis upon which this nation was founded. The means of equal access to education, equal chances to go to college. The people have demanded that we never squash the hope of science with the politics of partisan personal gain, that we never play games with the opportunity to save lives. They know that the minute that this great nation stops being a beacon of hope and a champions of forward progress for the world, that we become something less than what we are. The people have demanded that we never allow the concerns of special interests to collide with the public good. That there will come a day when the quality of our time will be judged not only on our ability to pioneer lifesaving drugs but the ability to make them available to all of our citizens. The people have demanded that when you gather a group of our nation leading us in experts, and ask them to take a hard look at what we need to do to keep our people safe and make our nation stronger that they take on that charge and honor their commitment, that you do everything necessary to implement their recommendations handed down to you, and the people have demanded that the conduct of our public officials be beyond reproach, that the great balancing act of our democracy rests on public trust that is fragile as it is but for the past 12 years, politics has demanded something different. Between the 104th and 109th congress, 6,900 roll call votes were taken and politics prevailed every time. In the first few hours of the 110th congress, the people have had their day. The people compelled us to raise the minimum wage, not politics. The people asked us to work to cut student loans in half, not politics. The people led us to expand stem cell research, not politics. and concern for those people made it imperative that we implement the recommendations of the 9/11 commission and that we take away the tax breaks for oil companies that have made their profits on the back of recent American suffering, that we start a process for real meaningful negotiation for prescription drugs, not politics, and the people move us to make immediate changes in the ethical rules that govern this chamber. Their commitment to a new day in America and a new day in congress made it vital that we restore the public trust. We saw the faces and heard the needs of the people we were elected to serve, and in this first 100 hours, we have acted. We have brought in new leadership that recognizes that this was a nation disconnected with its government, and they have taken immediate and bottled steps to reconnect it. And I would be remiss not to commend the leadership's admirable example for the past two weeks. The people were at the heart of what we have done here so far, and the people will be at the heart of the legislative agenda as we champions in the days to come. Mr. Speaker, these past two weeks have been times of great change, historic times that herald an era of American politics unique in its tone and compelling in its vision. You can be sure that this was only the start and that the people will regain their rightful role in this democracy in the days and years to come. Thank you.