This episode — among my final What’s Left? interviews — caused me to realize I needed to launch my own project, one that blended my actual journalism (of which there are thousands of paid, published clips now languishing “out of cite” in obscurity) with these focused, not-at-all-sensationalistic interviews with people about their jobs. I’d never spoken to a former senator before, and I doubt many others have, so I used this as an opportunity to discuss his work in greater depth.
In this episode, I talk to retired United States Senator Jeff Bingaman (D-NM, served 1983-2013) about how the legislative process evolved during his 30 years in Washington, D.C. We discuss the debt ceiling, successful instances of past bipartisan cooperation, the war in Iraq, industrial policy, energy policy, and much more.
Senator Bingaman's new book Breakdown: Lessons for a Congress in Crisis offers an insightful, first-hand analysis of the causes and consequences of the dysfunction in Congress. Some of the sections, like the one concerning Bingaman's critical role in the passage of the Affordable Care Act, are extremely detailed and should prove useful to political scientists, historians, and others looking for primary sources related to these topics.
One topic not discussed during this interview was Bingaman's exceptional 1982 campaign. While running against incumbent Harrison Schmitt, who was and still is the most recent person to have walked on the moon, Bingaman utilized the campaign slogan "What on Earth has he done for you lately?" in the course of drawing attention to Schmitt's seeming neglect of local matters.
The Work of Government (w/ Senator Jeff Bingaman)