Hello, friends. Welcome back to the Bill Press pod, and thank you for joining us.

President Joe Biden scored the first big win of his presidency last week with passage of the $1.9 trillion American rescue plan,

full of badly needed help for middle class Americans,

single moms, small businesses, and restaurants hammered by the coronavirus as well of a lot of

other people. But no matter how critical or far reaching or how popular it was, the stimulus package

won with the support of Democrats only. Not one single Republican

in the House or the Senate. Not one voted for it. And that doesn't vote well for chances

of getting Congress to act on other important issues, like infrastructure, immigration, or

climate change, especially with the Senate

split 50-50. So is there any hope at all for bipartisan action on any issue? Is it finally time

to get rid of the filibuster? If so, how? Joining us today, Norm Ornstein, one of the leading experts on Congress, a meritist

scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, and co-author with Thomas Mann of the great book

about Congress called It's Even Worse Than It Looks. Norm Ornstein, welcome back to the Bill

Press Pod. Good to talk to you.

It's always great to talk to you, Bill.

So, Norm, I have here in my hands a copy nine years ago. You wrote a, you and Thomas Mann wrote a devastating critique of the United States Congress called It's Even Worse Than It Looks,

Nine years ago, Norm, looking at it today, has it gotten any better since?

You know, I joked after we did the paperback version of that, which is it's even worse than it was,

that the next one would be run for your lives.

And I'll tell you, Bill, if Donald Trump had managed to win re-election, one way or the other,

that's where we would have been.

But, you know, the reality is it's certainly better not to have an autocrat, nativist, racist regime in place, but we've still got lots of big challenges ahead.

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