This is harder than I thought.

Here's a speech I just turned in for my speechwriting class. We had to write a speech for and against lowering the drinking age to 18. Here's my case for leaving it the way it is. This side of the debate does not necessarily represent my personal views on the issue, which made this speech a bit of a challenge. Interestingly enough, I ended up writing a more effective speech for this side of the issue than the side I agreed with.

I would love to hear any feedback you have.

We Can’t Afford to Change the Drinking Age

Our streets, our college campuses, and our ditches are littered with the bodies of 5,000 children and teenagers. Bodies that carry the putrid stench of beer and booze.

5,000 children and teenagers—165 kindergarten classrooms, 330 little league soccer teams, 125 troops of girl scouts—are killed each year at the hands of underage drinking.

Some say lowering the drinking age to 18 could solve this devastating problem. They even suggest that lowering the drinking age could save lives.

The statistics on alcohol deaths are staggering, but they could be even worse. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates that the drinking age of 21 saves one thousand lives each year. Those are one thousand lives worth saving. One thousand lives is too high a price to pay to experiment with a new drinking age.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services calls underage drinking a “leading public health problem in this country”. It is a problem that we must address in all its complexity. But we have a high drinking age in this country for a reason: because it actually saves lives.

To those who argue that lowering the drinking age will somehow improve the culture around underage drinking: I ask you to look across the world to New Zealand.

They too faced the deadly nightmare of underage drinking. But in 2000, New Zealand listened to the advice of the proponents of a lower drinking age. They decreased their drinking age from 21 to 18. And the results were disturbingly clear. After they changed their drinking age, alcohol-related crashes increased by 12%. In this country, that would mean 600 more kids dead on the road every year.

Changing the drinking age sounds like an easy fix to a complex problem. But this change would only add to alcohol’s rising death toll. Instead, we must combat underage drinking with efforts in the home, in our schools, and on our streets. Parents should be more vigilant about where their kids are going. Universities must be more open with their students about the costs of drinking. And every American should grow up knowing that drinking and driving will not be tolerated in this country.

But as long as our drinking age saves the life of even one child or teenager, we must keep it that way.

Speechwriting Job Talk

Here's a cool article from American University's website about a panel who came to my Speechwriting class and discussed their experiences in the Washington job market after taking the class.

It was an interesting discussion, and it got me excited about what's possible in the future.

The Senate Rules Committee

A couple weeks ago, I posted a blog about my class assignment to attend a meeting of a Senate or House committee. I ended up attending the Senate Rules Committee, and here is a summary of the meeting that I wrote for my seminar class:

On February 2^nd, I attended a hearing in the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration entitled “Corporate American vs. the Voter: Examining the Supreme Court’s Decision to Allow Unlimited Corporate Spending in Elections”. One of the goals of the hearing, as stated by committee Chairman Chuck Schumer (D-New York) was to “listen to ideas in order to find a way forward” in the aftermath of the controversial Supreme Court decision Citizen’s United vs. Federal Elections Commission. The committee invited a variety of experts in order to help the Senators examine some of the implications and ramifications of the decision. The committee also wanted to hear from the panel of experts what steps would be legally and practically feasible for Congress to include in their response to the decision.

Aside from committee Chairman Chuck Schumer, the other key players in the hearing included the ranking member Robert Bennett (R-Utah), witnesses Senators John Kerry (D-Massachusetts) and Russ Feingold (D-Wisconsin), and the panel of other witnesses which included the Attorney General of Montana, Constitutional law professors, and representatives of two advocacy groups. A few other Senators from the Committee participated—all from the majority. Senator Bennett, the ranking member of the committee, was the only Republican to participate in the hearing.

From my observation, the hearing seemed to accomplish one of the goals stated by the committee Chairman, but not the other. The first goal of the hearing was to “find a way forward” from the Court’s decision. The hearing provided a forum in which the Committee could put forth possible responses to the decision, and the panel could give the Committee feedback on those proposals. The Committee was interested to find which various legislative proposals would be both legally available to Congress in light of the decision, and effective in limiting the influence of corporations.

The other goal of the hearing was to discover the implications of the decision; how exactly Campaign Finance law was affected by Citizen’s United. This goal was not accomplished as successfully because the members of the Committee (with the exception of the Republican ranking member) came into the hearing already expressing their belief that the decision had catastrophic implications for American democracy. Senator Schumer called the decision “disastrous and corrosive to our democracy”, Senator Durbin asserted that the judges radically overturned precedent in the decision, and Senator Feingold called the decision a “tragic error”. The panel of experts, on the other hand, seemed mixed in their assessment of the situation. An election law expert from George Mason University, for example, suggested that no one could be sure what the result will be, and that there might be little difference in the way that corporations participate in elections in the future. A professor of Law from Ohio State University said that the new precedent set by this decision “might not actually be that big”. Other panelists held the opposing view. In spite of this difference of opinion, the Committee did not seem interested in some of the experts’ view of the situation.

During the hearing, I saw the power that the Committee Chairman’s agenda had in shaping the proceedings. The Chairman spoke first and was able to set the tone of the hearing. He questioned the panel first, which gave him the first chance to pull information from the experts. The Committee came into the hearing with a clear agenda: to test out legislative responses to the Supreme Court decision that they already saw as dangerous for democracy. The hearing was dominated by Democrats—the other Republican members did not even bother to show up. The ranking Republican member, speaking right after the Chairman, put up a very weak defense of the decision and participated very little in the hearing.

The Rules Committee hearing gave me a small insight into how the Committee process of the Senate works. I saw how a Committee’s agenda can play out in the proceedings, how witness testimony can be used to further the member’s policy goals, and how some of the power dynamics of the Senate play out in the Committee setting.

Still Snowed In

Today is yet another day off from work, school, and general productivity. While wallowing in my sedentary existence, I found this blog post from Congressman Earl Blumenauer (D-Oregon), about how he creatively dealt with the DC storm. It's inspiring and a little bit endearing.

More Snow Days!

Today was another day off of school. DC got another foot of snow combined with a windchill of 4 degrees, and 30-50 MPH gusts. We ventured out into the blizzard to try to get some dinner, and it was a mess out there. I'm still waiting to hear if I work tomorrow, they haven't announced whether or not the federal government will be closed for a 4th straight day.

Apparently, this afternoon, this storm dumped so much snow that they can officially call this the snowiest winter on record EVER for DC. We just broke a record set in 1835 or something. What a time to be here!

The bad side of all of this is we've missed out on a week of being able to go out and see the city, a week of classes and guest speakers, and potentially, two days of internship. I think I'm just ready to be un-stranded.

Snow Day(s)!

Washington DC is currently in the middle of a big winter storm. Last week, we got 30 inches of snow, and tonight we are supposed to receive 10-20 more inches. Professors have canceled classes through Wednesday, and who knows if I'll be able to make it to my internship on Thursday. Everyone's starting to get a bit of cabin fever since all buses are shut down and the trains are operating on a limited schedule. We're all pretty much stuck indoors.

Here are a few photos from the storm. The first 3 are from a mass-Facebook-organized Snowball Fight.

On the Hill

Today my class went up to the Hill to meet with Congressman Donald Manzullo, a Republican from rural northern Illinois. My Professor told us beforehand that Congressmen usually only meet with his classes for about 20 minutes, then run off to some important meeting somewhere.

Congressman Manzullo met with us for almost an hour and a half.

He called this part of his job--talking with students like us--"therapy". One story he told us really stuck with me. Part of his district includes the city where the Obama administration plans to move suspected terrorists from Guantanamo Bay. He said that the administration gave him less than 12 hours notice before they announced their decision. He was given no say in the matter. Some experts claimed that the Congressman's district, should the administration make the move, could be a new target for terrorists, a huge "security risk".

The Congressman told us about how he quickly became obsessed with the issue. Fearing for his constituents, he no longer slept at night. He said he couldn't bear the thought of a disaster in his district, something that would be on his conscience for the rest of his life. His staff began to notice, and convinced him to concentrate on other issues for the sake of his sanity. They said he was "too close" to this one.

Even the biggest cynic in that room couldn't see the Congressman as anything less than genuine. No matter your politics, no matter the facts of the case, to see this man talk so passionately about his district and the responsibility he felt for it was truly inspiring.

In a time of such cynicism and distrust of government, it was a powerful moment.

The Politicos: Part II

Here's an article from American University's Website about my Speechwriting Professor. And here's one that quotes him about Obama's first State of the Union address.

A Committee Meeting

Tomorrow for my class, I have to attend a committee meeting on either the House or the Senate side. Here are some of my choices.

Senate Armed Services Committee:
About the Defense budget.
I'd get to hear:
Senator John McCain
Senator Joe Lieberman
Senator Roland Burris(ha ha!)
Secretary of Defense Gates
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

Senate Budget Committee:
About the budget in general. Very popular hearing.
I'd get to hear:
Senator Ron Wyden (my boss)
Peter Orzag, in charge of the Office of Management and Budget!

Senate Finance Committee:
About Obama's health care proposals.
I'd get to hear:
Senator John Kerry
Senator Ron Wyden
Kathleen Sibelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services

Senate Rules Committee:
About the Supreme Court decision (campaign finance).
I'd get to hear:
Senator Chuck Schumer
Senator Mitch McConnell (which would be entertaining)
Senator Christopher Dodd
Senator John Kerry
And a bunch of interesting witnesses.

Which one should I choose? This will give me a really interesting opportunity to see some high-profile Senators up close as well as hear from some very interesting witnesses. I am very excited!