By Fredie Carmichael

editor@themeridianstar.com

Newly-elected U.S. Rep. Gregg Harper, R-Miss., is among the new kids on the block on Capitol HIll.

Harper has been on the job for less than a month, replacing Chip Pickering in the Third Congressional District.

Last week, amid the flurry of activities from the inauguration, Harper took time between debating legislation to offer a handful of personal tours of the Capitol to families in town for the festivities.

He then poured a Dr. Pepper and sat down with The Meridian Star for a brief question and answer session.

The Meridian Star: Tell us a little bit about your first few weeks in office and this inauguration week?

U.S. Rep. Gregg Harper: "It's been an incredible experience. I'm so excited to be serving the folks of my state. I just finished up with some family tours and they're great. I've said that if I'm available, I'm doing the tour. I want to do those when families come in.

"Sitting up on that platform looking out (during the swearing-in), it was a visual I'll never forget. I could never see the end of the people. I assumed they were sitting on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. It was an exciting day and it was a part of history."

The Star: Do you plan a home in Washington, or will you be commuting?

Harper: "I'm definitely a commuter. The plan right now is to fly in on Monday and fly back either late Thursday or sometime Friday. Then, on the weekends, I'll be working from home. But it's important that I make time for my family. That is a must."

The Star: What is the most important piece of legislation Congress is dealing with at this time?

Harper: "One of them is the SCHIP (State Children's Health Insurance Program) that we voted on last week. (The legislation is a $31.5 billion measure to expand the program for another 4 1/2 years). I support the reauthorization of SCHIP, but the version that the liberal Democrats put forward so expanded the program — took it from $30 billion to $65 billion — and will now cover folks that make close to $80,000 a year, and adults. The thing that bothered me the most is that they're saying $5 billion of that will go to provide benefits to illegals. It also removes the face-to-face meeting, which absolutely opens the program to fraud. We have to remember that this was a Republican-led bill more than a decade ago as part of the Welfare Reform Act.

It was a very good concept to take those on welfare and prepare them for the workforce. And it's now, as most government programs do, grown into something too big.

The Star: There has been a lot of talk lately about bipartisanship lately, what have you seen to that end in your first few weeks in Washington?

Harper: "The liberal Democrat leadership definition of bipartisanship is 'don't bother us.' And my complaint is, it's really hard for them to embrace the principle of bipartisanship after DCCC (Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee) spent sometimes more than a million dollars against some of those new Republicans in very ugly, negative ads. If you want to talk about bipartisanship maybe you should stop the garbage first.

We need to properly vet these bills. We need to go through the normal hearing process. Let folks hear what's in these bills. We're going to have to do a better job of blocking and tackling, and sticking with the fundamentals. It's almost the form of propaganda. You call it something warm and fuzzy, but it's really nothing more than pure socialism. We've got to do a better job at countering that and explaining why some of these things are going to break the country.

The Star: How many more bailouts will we see? Is this the proper answer to our economic crisis?

Harper: "We have a lot of people that are hurting and we're very sensitive to that. We have lots of folks who have lost fortunes, their life savings, their jobs ... it's serious. But what we've heard — that this is the worst economy since the Great Depression — is not accurate. It's bad, but it's not that. What's more accurate: this is the worst economy since Jimmy Carter. That would be accurate.

One of the ways they recovered from that was across the board tax reductions. We can't just throw money at it and with more government programs. That won't work.

"It would be one thing if we were taking care of the people who are suffering — what about the folks in Mississippi who lost their life savings with WorldCom? But we're taking care of big entities who have mismanaged themselves. I have a problem with some of those issues.

"I think the release the of the additional $350 billion is not a good idea. I just think right now if you really care about children, then we don't need to make our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren get saddled with the national debt that they'll never be able to get out of.

"When you've dug yourself a hole, stop digging. That's what I've always been told. But we've brought in heavy equipment to keep digging. There's no way to get it out. Those are going to be the ongoing battles. Their solution is going to be more government and more regulation and I just think that's a really bad idea.

The Star: What is the most pressing issue that your constituency will be facing in the coming year that you hope to address?

Harper: "Most of our folks back home — yes there were foreclosures and lost jobs — but most were doing OK until $4 a gallon of gas. That hurt our students, our low income folks, our seniors ... and we haven't fixed it. We're already seeing it inch back up. We've done absolutely nothing to fix it. We have some folks over here in government policy positions and their goal is the reduction and use of fossil fuels. They have a micro goal when they should have an overall goal that includes some control that allows us to drill offshore and any place when can get natural gas ... and things like clean coal technology in Kemper County. And we have to explore nuclear. We should be about anything that keeps us from sending our nation's wealth to the Middle East or other foreign countries. I just don't think we can afford going back to $4 gas. We've got to fix that."