“D.C. really loves characters. It really loves the story behind a person. The policy and the voting record is secondary to the person,” Marcus Sakey, the crime novelist and host of Travel Channel’s “Hidden City,” said about the interwoven tales of former Mayor Marion Barry and Washington, D.C.
Every day, Members get thick volumes of the Congressional Record delivered to their offices. Marked-up paper copies of amendments still circulate in committee. But some are daring to imagine a Congress where all communication is done electronically.
It’s been a decade since Rep. Billy Tauzin grilled Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling.
In 1297, King Edward I’s war against Scotland was not going so well. To assuage his dissatisfied nobles and persuade them to finance the battle against William Wallace (of “Braveheart” fame), the English king known as Longshanks reaffirmed the nobility’s rights and the limits on his power that were enshrined 82 years earlier in the Magna Carta.
Growing up in Alabama, Ben Dunham was more into sports than he was into school. Dunham, now the legislative director for Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.), remembers thinking that it would be football rather than physics class that would ultimately pay off.
The high-ceilinged House Ways and Means Committee room hosted a markup Friday of a Republican energy and infrastructure bill, giving lawmakers plenty of room to air their views on the controversial topic.
Washington women have to navigate the same maze as their male colleagues but with different rules. To pretend they don’t is as silly as it is disingenuous. What’s more — as the exhibit “Shakespeare’s Sisters: Voices of English and European Women Writers, 1500-1700” shows — women have always faced this challenge. And we’ve done it with some serious style.
Around D.C., only the would-be powerful or tearfully apologetic elect to slide behind lecterns in the harsh light of day and do the public address thing. But come Wednesday, Congress’ closeted crooners climb down from their mountain and make a beeline for Hill Country, where they loudly and proudly belt out their personal anthems with a little help from the HariKaraoke Band.
This Brownie, from Troop 259 in Maryland, was not entirely enjoying Wednesday’s festivities in the Cannon House Office Building Caucus Room celebrating the centennial of the Girl Scouts. The event featured speeches by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.
All Rep. Emanuel Cleaver wants is for his hometown’s World War I memorial to have the status of a national monument. But as with most things on Capitol Hill, it’s not so simple for the Missouri Democrat and Congressional Black Caucus chairman.
It was a game worthy of a Super Bowl finish. Down by 8 points with seconds to go in the championship game of the Senate Flag Football League, Fun Boy Football ran a Joan of Arc miracle play — first cousin to the Hail Mary — finding Helen Dwight in the end zone as time expired.
We love how this photo looks like a jigsaw puzzle and also how the entire frame is in silhouette with the exception of the flag catching a beam of light just below where Steven Graham of the Architect of the Capitol’s tree division does a little pre-spring pruning of the red oak trees in Upper Senate Park.
The rewards of teaching are many. Rarely are they made so apparent as in the case of Helen Engstrom and two of her prize pupils — Nan Hayworth and Todd Rokita.
Scott Farris has a personal perspective on losing. In 1998, as the Democratic nominee for Wyoming’s lone House seat, he was handily defeated by former Rep. Barbara Cubin.
The clear expectation is Congress will get very little done this election year. But what does get accomplished, at least in the high-profile areas, will largely be the handiwork of an elite group of staffers — who combine policy expertise, political acumen and the trust of their lawmaker bosses to drive much of the legislative agenda.
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