On June 23rd, 2009 I was joined by over 200 different city, town, and community leaders from our state to celebrate the 8th Massachusetts Day on Capitol Hill. Massachusetts Day is a unique opportunity for people from across the Commonwealth to meet with D.C. insiders, policy makers and pundits to learn about how Washington is changing and what sorts of decisions are being made that will have an impact back home.

We had a diverse group of attendees including elected officials, representatives from our academic institutions, leaders in the telecom, bio technology and research fields, local advocates, health care providers, and many more. They were able to hear from some of the leaders in health care and education reform, foreign policy experts and innovators on energy policy.

I was joined by my good friends in the Senate, Majority Leader Harry Reid, Senator Max Baucus and Senator Dick Lugar. In the spirit of bi-partisanship, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and former Speaker Newt Gingrich joined us to give their very different perspectives on the state of the country. Many of the members of the Massachusetts delegation joined us as well in celebrating the strength and innovation of Massachusetts. Vice President Joe Biden sent us a special video welcome and we were able to meet with Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and hear about his exciting ideas about increasing education investment for Massachusetts. This Week host George Stephanopoulos and Face the Nation moderator Bob Schieffer added some important insight on the new administration and Congress.

And of course no Massachusetts day would be complete without our beloved Red Sox! Many of us headed to the National Stadium to watch the Red Sox completely demolish the Nationals. Thank you to everyone who participated and I hope to see many of you next year for Massachusetts Day 2010!

If you'd like to see just a few pictures from the day, click here!