WASHINGTON, D.C.--Democrats were easy to spot here last week: They were the ones grinning. The dismissal of the Paula Jones case means their president won't have to testify about the exploits of the appendage known on Capitol Hill as "Little Elvis." Republicans were left trying to keep the flaccid sex scandal alive. Oregon Sen. Gordon Smith took time during a press conference about his current trip to Russia to weigh in. The president, Smith said, wasn't "out of the woods" yet. "In the end this isn't about sex, it's about obstruction of justice and suborning of perjury," Smith said, referring to charges that Clinton has pressured Monica Lewinsky to lie about their alleged liaisons. Smarting from attacks by Christian conservatives who say he's gone soft on them, Smith was able to attach an amendment to the Senate's $1.7 trillion budget plan: a ban on using federal funds for medicinal marijuana. "Drug use, including marijuana, is not acceptable," says Smith. "It is dangerous and can be deadly in any form." Oregon's other senator, Ron Wyden, spent some late nights last week cracking down on a different kind of leafy substance. Though just a freshman, Wyden was one of the players that Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John McCain struggled to please with his landmark tobacco legislation, which will cost the tobacco industry more than $500 billion in the next 20 years. "If you told me four years ago that we'd be debating whether to add $1.10 or $1.50 to every pack of cigarettes to deter teen smoking, I would have asked what you were smoking," says Wyden, who made a name for himself by grilling cigarette makers during the House's famous 1994 tobacco hearings. There's still a rough road ahead, particularly for Wyden's two pet issues: restricting cigarette exports and creating an "accountability panel" to monitor the tobacco industry. Rep. Peter DeFazio had a bumpier ride last week. The humongous $217 billion roads-and-rail package he championed was called pork-laden by the White House, watchdog groups and budget hawks. With arms waving and voice rising, the Eugene congressman was unrepentant on the floor. "It's not too much to ask to spend every penny [of the federal gas tax] on transportation infrastructure," argued DeFazio, who transports himself around Washington in a copper-colored 1967 Barracuda convertible. Congressional leaders then stiffed DeFazio, leaving him off the panel that will reconcile differences between the House and Senate highway bills. Few members of Congress have less clout than a freshman Democrat from Oregon--and Portland's Earl Blumenauer has a closet-size office to prove it. That hasn't kept Blumenauer out of the spotlight. Twice last week he got precious face time in front of TV cameras. First, he was the only House member invited to speak at a press conference touting a new Jonesboro-inspired gun-control bill. (Blumenauer sponsored a similar bill last year.) Then Fox Sports squeezed into his office to ask about his "Give Fans a Chance" legislation, which would allow locals to bid on football teams before owners could move a franchise. Blumenauer's fan-bill and the rest of his "livable communities" agenda has won praise from national columnists David Broder, E.J. Dionne and Neal Peirce. Trivial pursuits: Roll Call newspaper noted that April Fool's day on the Hill just wasn't the same without ex-Rep. Wes Cooley, the "brain surgeon from Oregon." |
