Starboard Broadside

I think freshman Rep. Tom Perriello (D-VA-05) is one of the greatest and most courageous newer members of congress right now. He's put everything on the line and stuck to his guns, despite the risk to his re-election prospects in his second race in his conservative Virginia district.

There's a new Grist interview with him focusing mostly on his vote last year for the House's energy/climate/jobs bill known as ACES or Waxman-Markey, and while it's great from start to finish, I particularly enjoyed his answer on the last question (about the latest Senate energy bill wrangling) where he sticks it to the US Senate for messing with the country's future on so many issues. It's broken, and we all know it, and he doesn't self-censor in expressing that opinion:

That’s more insider baseball crap. I don’t really care. I’m sick of starting with what can we get through the Senate; let’s start with what solves the damn problem. Until the Senate gets its head out of its rear-end and starts to see the crisis we’re in, our country is literally at risk. Our economy is at risk, because these jobs are being created overseas. It should have the same urgency with this problem that it had bailing out Wall Street.

We are swearing an oath to do what’s necessary to protect this country, not do what’s necessary to get a bill through the Senate. If you look at what voters were upset with on the health-care bill, it was all the carve-outs and exemptions and watering it down. Voters are smart; they know that the House bill stood up to the health insurance companies and the Senate bill didn’t. The same thing is true here: If they respect that the bill is actually going to transform our economy, make us more competitive and more independent, they’ll support it. If it seems like it’s just a sell-out to the big donors from the oil and gas companies, they won’t support it.

That’s the question that we should be asking: Does this solve the problem? Is this a solution worthy of the American people? And if it is, then great; let’s move forward with it.

Damn straight. As previously stated, Tom Perriello's got a tough re-election fight ahead of him this year... you can check out his campaign site, Perriello for Congress, to find out more about him. If you're not moved to action by his bold vote on the climate bill or his sturdy principles alone, how about this statement he recently made summing up his other big frustrations in Washington?

“I have several major disappointments,” Perriello said of the past year. “I think the Democratic Party screwed up a lot in Washington, but it was very clear the Republicans were directed not to work with us in any way. I understand it’s a nasty place; it’s a political place. I’ve got thick skin. But when your country’s on the verge of depression, that’s not the time to say ‘Let’s tee up in 2010.’ It’s time to come together.”

He's not one for sitting around and singing the praises of the bipartisan mirage that can never be reached, and he knows that for all the Republican obstruction that went on this past year, the Democrats could have done more to avoid it and chose not to.