“The strategy of being obstructionist can work or fail. So far it’s worked for us.”

- Senator Trent Lott
Republican Minority Whip

The Democrats had a visionary plan for America that they planned to enact within the first hundred hours after the inauguration. In just 42 hours, less than half of their 100 hour deadline, House Democrats met their goals and passed a slew of groundbreaking legislation:

• Cleaning up congress and separating legislators from lobbyists (H.Res. 6, Title II)
• Adopting pay-as-you-go rules to prevent new deficit spending (H.Res. 6, Title IV)
• Protecting America by implementing the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission (H.R. 1)
• Helping America’s working class by raising the minimum wage (H.R. 2)
• Providing hope for millions by promoting more stem cell research (H.R. 3)
• Making healthcare more affordable by fixing the Medicare prescription drug program (H.R. 4)
• Cutting interest rates for student loans in half (H.R. 5)
• Moving America towards energy independence by cutting massive government subsidies for the oil industry (H.R. 6)

Many of these bills passed with broad bipartisan majorities in the House, further emphasizing the mandate for change the Democratic Party was given by the American people.

Unfortunately, Senate Republicans and George W. Bush didn’t care what the people of America wanted. They committed themselves to denying Congressional Democrats any kind of political victory by repeatedly blocking the people’s business in Congress. They abused the filibuster and the veto pen to stand in the way of progress, despite having lost the trust and the faith of the American people.

In fact, Mitch McConnell’s Roadblock Republicans have broken the record for the most filibusters in one Congress. In the two years of the 107th Congress, there were 61 filibusters; in just the first year of the 110th Congress, there have been 62 filibusters. At this rate, by the time the 110th Congress ends, the Roadblock Republicans will have about 134 filibusters under their belt, more than doubling the previous record.

The most shameful part of the Roadblock Republicans’ record is their obstructionism on the Iraq war. They blocked timetables, they blocked exit strategies, they blocked pay raises for our troops, they blocked vacation time for soldiers, etc. Time after time, the GOP blocked Democratic efforts to end the Iraq war and bring our troops home. Time after time, they demanded Congress write blank checks to George W. Bush to fund his war. And as the Roadblock Republicans kept the war in Iraq going, 2007 saw 899 American casualties in Iraq, making it the deadliest year of the war to date.

How much violence could have been prevented had a timetable been passed? How many casualties could be prevented if we implemented an exit strategy? How many more American soldiers would have lived to see 2008 had the Roadblock Republicans not put politics and partisanship first?

Partisanship is the problem, but it is not a bipartisan problem. We Democrats compromised, we ceded, we bent over backwards to accommodate Republican demands In response, the Roadblock Republicans refused to compromise, to put politics aside and to work with us for the good of this country. The GOP needs to learn that obstructionism isn’t a strategy, that the American people won’t stand for a party who puts politics first.

The only solution to the Roadblock Republicans is to elect more Democrats–to render the GOP incapable of obstructing the people’s business any longer. It’s sad that it has come to this–that the Republicans have become so out of touch, so radical, so extremist that they cannot put their partisanship aside, even for the good of the country.

2007 should be an infamous year in American history. It was the year that one of our major political parties put politics ahead of the people they were elected to represent. It was the year that the GOP cast aside their vision, their ideas and their ideology in favor of obstructionism. 2007 was the year of the Roadblock Republicans, and it’s a year that the American people will remember on Election Day 2008. Come November, the American people will hold the Roadblock Republicans responsible for their years of intransigence and stubbornness.