Like No Other Time
The 107th Congress and the Two Years That Changed America Forever
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- $6.99
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- $6.99
Publisher Description
Tom Daschle, the Majority Leader of the historic 107th Senate, presents a candid insider’s account of the workings of the U.S. government during two of the most tumultuous years in the nation’s history.
The 107th Congress faced a time like no other in the life of the nation. This was the era of the first presidential election to be decided by the United States Supreme Court, the fifty-fifty Senate, the horror of September 11, the anthrax attacks on media and the government (including Daschle’s own office), the war on terrorism, corporate scandals that shook the economy, the inexorable move toward war with Iraq, and other dramatic events, all leading up to the historic midterm elections of 2002.
Through it all, Senator Tom Daschle had, with the exception of the President, the most privileged view of these unfolding developments, both in front of and behind the closed doors of government. In Like No Other Time, Daschle offers a riveting account of his singular perspective on a time when the nation faced deadly and elusive external enemies and a level of domestic political contention rarely seen in American history. Senator Daschle is un-flinching in his impressions of the key political figures of our time from both parties. The result is an acutely perceptive assessment of how our government met—and sometimes did not meet—the challenges of a remarkable era.
As it was during the years of the 107th Congress, the United States is once again at a critical and historic crossroads. Our choices, based on what we have learned from our recent past, will affect our future in profound ways. For Senator Daschle, the first and perhaps most important choice lies with what kind of representation and leadership we want in government. It is a choice between a political party with a core philosophical belief in the power of our collective will to confront these challenges through our government, and one dominated by a group of people who don’t like and don’t believe in government.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
South Dakota Senator Daschle's account of the 107th Congress recalls an unusually eventful time: congruent with President Bush's first two years in office, it featured the September 11 attacks; the anthrax contamination of the Senate's Hart Office Building generally, and Daschle's quarters specifically; and the dramatic switch of Vermont's Senator Jim Jeffords from Republican to independent, which gave Democrats control of the Senate and elevated Daschle to majority leader. For added measure, the first resolution supporting the planned war in Iraq was also passed in that Congress. Daschle conveys his insider view in a straightforward narrative offering unique insight into the political establishment's reaction to these events. Daschle's description of his frustrations with his Republican opponents provides a deeper understanding of 21st-century politics. Daschle's antipathy for House Speaker Tom DeLay is striking: "I find myself wondering," he writes, "how a person like Tom DeLay holds the power he does, while holding such extreme positions and taking such a heavy-handed approach to leadership." And Daschle expresses white-hot anger at President Bush, with his "Texas swagger," who launched his relationship with Daschle by saying, "I hope you'll never lie to me." Justified as this anger might have been, these examples make clear that Republicans and Democrats are divided by a deep and destructive fissure a loss of bipartisanship that Daschle decries, and that, as he illustrates, devalues dissent and debate. 8 pages of b&w photos not seen by PW.