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SISTER BERTA GOES TO WASHINGTON
It is rare when decisions are so easy. But asking Sister Berta Sailer, of Kansas City’s Operation Breakthrough, to be my guest at the State of the Union Speech was a clear choice. She and Sister Corita Bussanmas have served poor and at-risk children in our central city for decades. They and their teachers are in the trenches each and every day working to make the lives of these kids better, safer and healthier. They fight the good fight and I was so pleased to ask her to come to Washington. And make no mistake, she made the best out of every minute she was in our nation’s capital. If you know Sister Berta you know she is definitely a presence to be reckoned with. And my belief is Washington needs her much more than she needs Washington. She wasted no time letting lawmakers know she was in town. It was a chance for her to do what she loves to do and has done for most of her life – advocate for children. I know she has told many folks it was an honor for her to be invited – but truly, the honor was all mine.
WHAT YOU WON’T HEAR ANYWHERE ELSE
First of all, Sister Berta immediately ran into trouble getting to Washington. Her flight from Kansas City was initially delayed for hours before they took to the air. Then, apparently because of weather issues in DC, the plane was rerouted to Pittsburgh for a landing. And that is where she was stuck for the night. Very early Tuesday morning she was able to get a flight from Pittsburgh into Washington. I urged her to rest before heading to the Hill for meetings we had scheduled but she was adamant about wanting to immediately get busy talking to anyone and everyone who would listen about ‘her kids’ at Operation Breakthrough. She was invited to come with me to a reception before the State of the Union speech. I wanted to give her every opportunity to meet with legislators so they could hear her story. Shortly into the reception I turned to talk with a colleague. When I turned back around she was gone. I said to my friend, “I have lost a nun!” We began moving about the room looking for Sister Berta and sure enough, we quickly found her. She was surrounded by a group of lawmakers who were completely entranced as they listened to her talk about poverty, at-risk children, and the needs of working families who are struggling to keep the lights on and feed their kids from the same paycheck. I simply smiled to myself and thought, “You go Sister Berta. You go!”
LIBERTY MEMORIAL BATTLE
In Washington this week I went into battle to protect our interest in getting the Liberty Memorial and the WWI Museum named the National Monument and Museum. As you know, I have introduced legislation to make this happen. And as you might have guessed, Washington is proving to be, well, Washington. This week confusion and controversy erupted surrounding parts of another bill that was joined with mine. That bill seeks to turn the monument in DC to the WWI Veterans into a national monument. Some in DC want that monument to remain as a tribute to those from that city. That is a different fight.
I testified in the hearing this week to explain the purpose of the bill I introduced and to make sure this DC concern does not endanger our efforts here to get Kansas City’s Memorial and WWI Museum the designation they so richly deserve. I wanted to update you on the latest and will continue to do so as I fight to keep my legislation alive and the effort for our area moving forward.
WHY WAIT FOR TRAGEDY TO TRIUMPH?
From tragedy and unspeakable pain often comes the realization that courage and sheer determination can finally force their way through the chaos. That is what I have witnessed in the wake of the shooting of my colleague, Congresswoman Gabby Giffords.
There were those initial moments of panic and fear that the assailant had succeeded in his mission to take her life. The joy that she had made it through those first hours was accompanied with the haunting uncertainty of what the injuries would mean for her future. This woman, my friend, a public servant, what would she be able to know, learn and accomplish in the future? But over the months she has proven herself to be a fighter of epic proportions. I have watched her struggle toward recovery with the same kind of focus I often saw as she fought for her constituents.
Something else has gripped me, too. In the moments following the shooting and in the year that has followed, I have watched, on a macroscopic level, our nation pull together to support her in her personal battle. Differences in political beliefs were quickly suspended as our country, with one voice, said, “We are with you.”
I saw it happen, too, this week, in the smaller world of Congress. Instead of focusing on differences, spin and negativity, Republicans and Democrats alike joined together on the House floor to honor Gabby and to say goodbye in the wake of her resignation. To say thank you to a person, and a politician, we admire and respect. I saw my Democratic colleagues crying. I saw my Republican colleagues crying. And in a moment I will never forget, I heard one Representative ask another if he was okay and if there was anything he needed. I have never heard these two men speak kindly to or of each other. But there they were, in the wake of tragedy, putting political dislikes aside to be kind, caring…and human.
I immediately flashed back to two other pivotal times in my life when I saw this happen.
I was asleep in the pre-dawn hours of November 29, 1988 when I heard a noise so loud it literally jolted me out of bed. I thought I was experiencing some sort of weather event. But soon my telephone rang and it was an officer. I was Mayor Pro Tem of Kansas City at the time and the Mayor was out of town. I was soon escorted from my home and briefed on what had happened. There had been a horrific explosion at a construction site. Six Kansas City firefighters had died. I was taken to the excavation site near 87th Street, which would later become the Bruce R. Watkins Drive to see the damage. I then went with law enforcement officers to the homes of the firefighters to tell family members someone they dearly loved had died in the line of duty. Immediately within the city and throughout surrounding areas, the outpouring of love and unity was overwhelming. This was at a time when there were differences and disagreements over issues surrounding work agreements, contracts and the like. But none of that mattered. We pulled together. We recognized there was something much bigger happening.
Many years later, the general manager of the Kansas City Chiefs, Carl Peterson, asked me to deliver the pre-game prayer at Arrowhead Stadium on the weekend following the World Trade Center attacks. NFL Commissioner, Paul Tagliabue, had postponed and rescheduled more than a dozen games after 9/11. That following weekend the Chiefs faced the New York Giants. If you are not familiar with Chiefs fans, and I think we all are, their enthusiasm, zeal and dedication to the team are virtually unmatched. Not often and not with many fans, but sometimes, that fervor turns into a display of bad sportsmanship between visiting fans, especially when a rival team comes to town. But at this game my eyes were glued to the stands during the game and the parking lots following the game. I watched as total strangers gave each other hugs, helped visitors find their cars, and stood together, both physically and in spirit, with fellow human beings who were hurting.
As I stood on the House Floor this week and watched the ceremony for Gabby and thought of these two other events in my lifetime, I couldn’t help but wonder why we only seem to find our better selves in the face of disaster. No doubt there are those who exhibit this type of kindness all of the time. But as a collective body, a group, and a nation, often we seem to get sidetracked, stalled and stereotyped by our differences in politics, race and religion. But on this day, Republicans and Democrats, men and women, all cried together. I can’t help but wonder what kind of a world we would live in if we set negativity aside … and reached for triumph each day, instead of waiting for tragedy.
CONSUMER REPORTS
I wanted to forward along to you some information my office received this week from the Consumers Union, the policy and advocacy division of Consumer Reports.
Consumers Union, the nonprofit policy and advocacy division of Consumer Reports, has launched a new web page to help consumers get a free credit report every year and avoid “imposter” web sites with dubious credit offers.
The new Consumers Union page is online at www.consumersunion.org/creditreport.
Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, consumers in the U.S. can request a free credit report every 12 months from each of the three major credit reporting companies: Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion. There is only one web site that offers consumers a truly free credit report that is authorized by federal law: AnnualCreditReport.com. Meanwhile, some web sites advertise competing offers for “free” credit services that may wind up costing money.
The new Consumers Union page at www.consumerunion.org/report gives people the facts they need to get their free reports and is encouraging people to check their credit reports every year to keep track of their accounts and credit history, correct mistakes in their reports, and be on the lookout for criminal activity, such as identity theft.
However, as helpful as a credit report is, it does not include one important item – a credit score. A consumer’s credit score is based on the information in his or her credit report. Lenders and other companies can look at credit scores to make big decisions about consumers, such as whether to approve them for loans. A credit score and a credit report are important tools for building someone’s financial future. People might assume that a credit report tells them their score, but it does not.
So, in addition to offering information about credit reports, our new web page www.consumersunion.org/creditreport has a petition to ask the federal government to make it so that consumers can get a credit score as part of their free, annual report.
CIVILITY CORNER
As my family and congregation are well aware, I am a monster movie maestro. In fact, I am protesting these new Twilight vampire movies. They are disgusting. After all, everyone knows that real vampires and real werewolves don’t date the same girl. This is a travesty that must be addressed by the horror scholars of this generation, otherwise millions of young kids will grow to adulthood thinking that Twilight movies are as accurate as Bram Stoker’s Dracula.
London’s Mary Shelly, on the other hand, is one of our world’s greatest contributors of the truth. In 1818 she wrote about one of the most iconic monsters in world history. Victor Frankenstein, a student of physiology, conducted an exotic experiment, which, if successful, would “imbue inanimate bodies with life.” His work, however, created a monster.
As we all know, the Frankenstein monster wreaks the most havoc on its creator. Today, when we use the expression, “a Frankenstein monster”, we are suggesting that an individual was squashed by his or her own doing. Dr. Frankenstein’s major mistake was somehow giving life to the monster. Mary Shelly does not say exactly how Dr. Frankenstein was able to “create”, but we are told it was a scientific process called “galvanism.”
When we engage in uncivil behavior, we create our own monster. Congress is slowly but surely bringing its own monster called acrimony to life, albeit in an unscientific manner. This Congressional Frankenstein now needlessly obstructs the goodwill and statesmanship of this body. There should be little question that together we soar, divided we sink.
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Emanuel Cleaver, II
Member of Congress
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