The senate is in at 1 00 eastern time. Votes are scheduled at 2 00 p. M. Eastern. Majority leader harry reid and minority leader mcconnell had set a deadline of 3 00 p. M. When theyre planning to convene a caucus meetings and update members of the parties on a possible plan for taxes and spending on the new year. Will bring you live coverage of the senate on cspan2 started at 1 00 eastern. In the house, the return of 2 00 p. M. Youll be considering a number of pieces of legislation. What the live coverage of the house here and cspan. Next, retiring senator kent conrad reflects on his career in congress to. It is currently Senate BudgetCommittee Chairman and was first elected to the senate in 1986. This is about half an hour. Senator conrad, your Farewell Speech was yesterday. What is that like . It has been great. I had the Going Away Party the night before. A lot of my colleagues were there. Then the Farewell Speech, in which i had a chance to reflect on my service here. But also, to challenge my colleagues to finish the job on the grand bargain to get our fiscal house in order. I laid out the specifics of what i thought would be a genuine compromise between the two sides. It was satisfying. Why did you decide not to run again . Many reasons. I have served your 26 years. Less than 5 of senators in history have served the long. Part of it is, i am tired of living out of a suitcase. I missed a of my wifes birthdays, 80 of our anniversaries. Sometimes change is a good thing. After 26 years, i felt the need to have somebody else take these responsibilities. Some people have written that the senate was not the same for you. That is true. My best friend, he and i have been together and political offices, a government responsibility for a very long time. More than three years. When he decided not to run again and my other colleague who was part of Team North Dakota was defeated, it was less rewarding for me personally to be here. Less enjoyable for me to be here. I am sure that played a role. In your speech yesterday, you used the expression of the senate we efforts right yesterday, as the worlds greatest deliberative body. Do you think the public shares that perception . Probably not. [laughter] were efficient at producing results. Deficient at producing results. What i also said yesterday was a there are problems here. The problems i believe are very clear is that we spend too much time trying to seek political advantage, too little time focused on solving the countrys problems. I am sure that had a role in my decision as well. I really came here wanting to do big things. Wanted to work on solving problems. There is been much less an emphasis on that lately and much more of an emphasis on how you get over on the other guy. I understand this is a team sport, a competitive environment we are in, but at the end of the day, if were not solving problems, it is pretty of the. Empty. Can you trace the trajectory of the partisanship . I can see it very directly going back to 1994. Newt gingrich, he had a view to take over the house of representatives, one hand to bring down the institution. Things have never been the same since. That is not to say that there were not very deep folds of the democratic side, because there were. Fault on the democratic side, because tehrthere were. It has set off a chain of events and a dynamic year that i think is very unhealthy. I hope very soon that we get back to working together, understanding that there is a competition, and solving problems. That is what the country needs. How much a role has the money in politics played any . Artisanship and throa huge. It is a cancer on our democracy. What that means is individual members now have to spend even more time fundraising, even more time being entirely political in order to survive. That is extremely unhealthy. What about the public themselves . Over the course of the last quartercentury, the country has become less aligned with parties, and that pushes the partys more to the extreme of many votes and 5050. 5050. It is a broad reflection of the American People. They choose who represents the here. Theyre deeply divided. Them here. Theyre deeply divided. Beyond that, you have the effect of media. The 24 hour news, the have all the time to fill. The look for the loudest voices to put on the air, the people who say the most outrageous things. But also has played a very central role in how this has evolved. Weve got to make some choices as a country here. Are we going to reward the extremists, or are we going to look to the sensible center as the place where decisions need to be made . In some of these cases, it is what it is. The Supreme Court has ruled on campaign financing, and the media is here to stay. Social media is here to stay. What do you see as a possibility . My own belief is actions. Actions are needed. Decisions need to be made. That requires leadership, people to step forward and say, look, follow me, and i will take us in a different direction. Were going to face up to these things. Then it is each individuals a choice. Are they going to be a part of that, are they going to be a part of this endless food fight . A few historians have written books recently about the great senators, the great leaders of the past, and suggesting there fewer and farther between. With your study of this institution, this body, would you agree with that . I think there are many Exceptional People here. I said in my Farewell Speech yesterday, i have enormous respect for this institution. The vast majority of my colleagues want to do the right thing. Many times, doing the right thing, it is hard to know what is the right have to take in the midst of all of this conflict. Half to take in the midst of all of this conflict. That is different from leadership. That is absolutely different from leadership. What we need very much is leadership at every level. And that means from individual members as well. They have got to decide, are they going to be a part of the herd, or they going to stand up and say what they truly believe . And are they going to be a part of solving problems. At the end of the day, this needs to be what it is about. You expecexpressed optimism n your Farewell Speech. Do you see signs here . My colleagues want a different direction. They want to be part of something that is producing results for the American People. I find republicans and democrats who really are like minded in the sense that they want to produce results. Were talking in a room the u. S. But a lot of time in. You came to the senate that uyoyou have spent a lot of time in. You can to the senate. What do you see as the legacy of time did you spend in this room . Back in the clinton years, we were able to actually balance the budget, we treated the longest period of uninterrupted growth. Created the longest period of uninterrupted growth. And we were paying down the debt. In recent times, ive been part of a nonpartisan commission to resolve these debt issues. There we had 11 of the 18 members agree on a plan to the country back on track. I still believe that is probably the best blueprint for going forward. I was also part of the group of six that became the group of eight, evenly divided the dream republicans and democrats. That between republicans and democrats. Lots to go back with. Let me start with the 1990s. How much of that success was the bursting economy with the tech bubble that was happening that brought more money into the coffers . All of these things are connected. That is my belief. Governmental policy, what happens in the private sector. Because we were showing that we could get results, the government could make decisions, that gave additional confidence to the private sector. There was additional certainty, because people knew what the rules of the rubber going to be for extended period of time. Of the road were going to be for an extended period of time. That unleashed corporate funding. I have had corporate leader after corporate leader telling me, part of the reason they are not unleashing that money in a new wave of investment is because of uncertainty they do not know what decisions are going to be made here. Uncertainty. They did not know what decisions are going to be made here. There are other gangs and groups of this and that have been formed in the past five or six years in the senate. How much of that is an indication of the institution not working as it should . When you have major problems, these groups tend to form. There is a long history of that here. Going back to Andrews Air Force base and the budget deal that was entered in their with president bush 41. When there are very complex financial matters, these special groups form because people have to spend a lot of time to get the whole work done and to get an understanding of how these complex questions can be resolved. I do not think that is so much a reflection of this function as it is historic president on how things get done here. When you look back historically as some of these other bipartisan commissions for other groups, you mentioned the Andrews Air Force base. During the reagan administration, the commission that found the solution for Social Security, the base Closing Commission each of these were big Public Forums where the discussions happened in front of the public and they still found a way to reach accord. Almost everything now seems to be happening behind closed doors. Why could openness and discussion of these issues have been in years past, and now today we cannot seem to get the deal in public arena . It is in large measure because the media has so changed. In those days, you did not have 24hour coverage. What you find with 24hour coverage, if an Idea Services at 10 00 in the morning, it is dead by 2 00 in the afternoon because everybody goes to the cameras. The cameras are there. Everpresent, wanting to hide something. Before and ideas even fully developed, debated, it is dead. You really see that around here. As to specifically the simpsonbowles commission, theres been a fair amount of criticism on the president for not embracing the findings of that commission. I advised the president not to embrace the specifics. I feared that House Republicans would automatically be in opposition. If you are part of this commission, you saw that dynamic. There were 18 of us. Six representing the president , six representing the u. S. Senate, six representing the house. Five of the six representatives of the president voted for the recommendations. Five of the six representatives of the u. S. Senate, republicans and democrats, voted for the recommendations. Five of the six representing the house voted against them. Both ds and rs. It kind of tells the story. What does it tell . [laughter] that the house that is posted on every two years is far more reluctant to make unpopular decisions voted on every two years is far more reluctant to make unpopular decisions. Does the institution still work for society . I think if the term was extended from two years to four years, that would give them the ability to get this back on track. If you are cutting programs and you are raising revenue, youre upsetting people. You are doing things that are not popular. To go back to your constituency and say, but i am going to be doing now is i am gonna to be cutting spending and a program that is very popular. At the same time, i am going to be raising revenue, which means raising somebodys taxes. At one point, we were borrowing 40¢ of every dollar we spend. At least we have made some improvement. Dollars being31¢ bein borrowed for every dollar we spend. We know that the trend line is not our friend. The revenue base is inadequate for meeting what has been the social compact social contract, to have Social Security, to have health care provided to the least our seniors. Now more broadly to a guarantee that everyone would have health care coverage. This is a challenging time for those who seek to represent their states and districts. Listening to one of the many press conferences happening in this town, a reporter described where we are right now as a situation of Washington Post own making. Washingtons own making. How did we get where we are right now . On the revenue side, you go back to the bush years. When they passed the bush tax cuts, for various procedural reasons, they wanted to shoehorn as much taxcutting as they could into a 10year period. Because of the rules, they really went overboard, did much more in the way of tax cutting and we could afford. It was very apparent at the time that they did it. They sunsetted it all after 10 years. The same is true with the so called sequester. Acrosstheboard cuts of 1. 20 trillion, focused on domestic spending, was put in place to try to provide leverage to the special committee that if it did not Reach Agreement, the sequester would drop and do something that nobody favors, an acrosstheboard cut. No distinctions, no prioritize nation. Just to cut across the board. Prioritization. Just to cut across the board. Going back to the bush years, what is congresss role in this . I vigorously and energetically opposed it. I said to my colleagues, this is going to lead to trouble. I laid out in great detail where i thought it would ultimately lead us. And here we are. Somebody said to me the other day, dont you sometimes feel like saying, hey, i told you so . It doesnt do any good. I do feel somewhat vindicated and that Alan Greenspan wrote in his book that he wished he had listened to my advice. It has not added up cargo during the same perio added up. During the same period, we had a two board sort of budget. Two offbudget wars. Shame on us. We of collectively made decisions and i thought going to iraq was a big mistake. It had nothing to do with the attack on United States in 9 11. But there was an amazing amount of confusion in the country. People somehow believe that iraq was behind 9 11. It was all kind operating out of afghanistan. Alqaeda operating out of afghanistan. Another very serious misjudgment theyre paying for. We have about 10 minutes left with you. I want to switch topics. He has also been a big step in of Energy Policy champion of Energy Policy. Discovery of natural gas in your state has changed the economy. Where do you think this New Discovery of this resource is going to lead us . I did it is incredibly positive for the United States. We of gone from 60 Foreign Energy dependence down to 40 . There are a lot of projections now the we could become Energy Independent over the next several decades. That would be an incredible boon to this country. Instead of sending 400 billion or five order billion dollars abroad every year to buy scarce Energy Supplies for people who do not particularly like us, we could be spending that at home. Think of the difference that will make to the economic strength of United States. Think about what it will mean to job opportunities, the economic strength of america. Natural gas is a very clean resources compared to many of the other options. Our progress. On reducing dependence has also been on grenobles. Progress on reducing dependence has also been on renewables. All across north dakota, you see these giant went generating machines. Wind generating machines. On top of that, increased fuel efficiency in cars, a dramatic improvement with much more to come, is reducing our demand for fossil fuels. These are all extremely positive developments for the country. What does it mean for your home state . A vibrant economy, the lowest unemployment in the country. The highest purchaser plus per capita of any state in the nation. Surplus per capita of any state in the country. Over the years, youve been in a champion of the states agriculture. I am interested in you having square your pride to bring home resources to north dakota with all this concern in United States you have expressed. It is easy to do. The farm bill we just passed reduces the deficit 23 billion. The last farm bill we passed that was completely paid for at my insistence as Budget Committee chairman. Everybody else was functioning we faced up to reality. Secto in this farm bill, even far more in the way of deficit reduction. It demonstrates this is possible to do. But you have got to have leadership. And youve got to have people who are willing to make some tough decisions to get it done. We have about five minutes. I want to talk a little more personal. You have decided to leave your papers of Public Service to George Washington university. Why is that . I got my masters in business there. They have tremendous resources there to take advantage of this collection, which is loaded with history. What kind of things will researchers and historians find . The will find that tim conrad has had a singleminded focus on fiscal responsibility for 26 years. [laughter] my staff says that a remarkable thing in looking at this collection is how consistent i have been but Pay Attention to fiscal responsibility and making sure that certain things add up. They say that they find my handwritten notes from day after day. And make a list every day of what i want to try to get accomplished that day. They said almost every day, at the top of the list is, deficit. Get the deficit under control. Until we actually did it in the 1990s. And why did i have this single minded focus . I have always understood, the most important responsibility of government is Economic Security of the people. If you do not have your Fiscal Affairs in order we learned in the economic downturns in my state, the debt to work for you. It can also question. The debt can work for you. It can also crush you. I do not want to see t