Kirk sees a place for moderates in Senate

In just over three weeks, Republican Mark Kirk will leave his post as a 10th District U.S. Rep and head to the upper chamber.

With a Democratic majority among the Senate's 100 members, experts say it could be difficult for Kirk to continue the moderate tradition he's established as a suburban Congressman over the past decade.

“It's much harder for Republicans to vote against party leadership in the Senate,” DePaul University Political Science Professor Michael Mezey said.

Kirk sees things differently.

Hours after winning Barack Obama's old Senate seat, Kirk said he sees more room to maneuver as a moderate in the Senate than perhaps in the House.

And while his early Wednesday victory speech in Wheeling described a shift in Illinois toward “center right,” Kirk said he won't be changing his moderate social and environmental views.

“I picked my words carefully,” Kirk said.

“I think we should be fiscal conservatives. That's what I meant. Giving people a greater and greater degree of authority ... over their own lives.”

With a Republican wave sweeping much of the country Tuesday, including the defeat of 14th District Congressman Bill Foster, 11th District Congresswoman Debbie Halvorsen and the possible defeat of 8th District Congresswoman Melissa Bean, Kirk noted the tea party movement “added energy” to Republican wins in the suburbs.

Still, he described a “mixed bag” overall, saying his 10th District successor, Republican Robert Dold, “won as an unabashed moderate.”

“We did see some very prominent conservative candidates defeated (across the country),” he said.

“Sometimes the winds blow left, sometimes they blow right. But there is an unshakable vital center. Oftentimes cable TV shows show the extreme left and the extreme right, leaving the people to ask, ‘who represents me?' I would say I am that candidate.”

Kirk says he believes “as a senator you can do a lot more.” Without a rules committee, he said, senators have more control over introducing pieces of legislation.

Kirk said he is ready to “repeal and reform” the health care legislation that Obama spent so much political capital getting passed.

He noted, however, “we obviously have the challenge of the president's veto.”

Still, he said, even with that veto, he thinks Congress can make changes to the current legislation, including to the rule that requires companies to file tax forms for any purchase or service transaction of $600 or more, a provision Kirk maintains would hurt small businesses. Obama on Wednesday said he would consider changing the provision.

“My hope is that a very large number of moderate Democrats would also support that,” Kirk said.

Kirk, who will take his place in the Senate on Nov. 29 _ three months earlier than his peers, also said he hopes to extend all tax cuts put in place by former President George Bush in 2001 and 2003.

Kirk said he supports the plan of Peter Orszag, Obama's former budget chief, calling for an extension of the cuts for two years, and then ending those cuts all together.

With the country's debt rising, Kirk promoted across the board spending cuts, calling for a new Grace Commission (a commission formed under President Reagan in 1982 to root out waste and inefficiency in the federal government) and an “up or down vote of outdated programs and waste.”

Kirk, a 21-year naval reservist, recommended consolidating the military commissary system and streamlining the joint forces command.

He said he is not a proponent of cutting Social Security and Medicare.

“We need to stop starting new spending programs, and cut back unnecessary ones,” he said.

Kirk received 48.4 percent of the statewide vote to Democrat Alexi Giannoulias' 46 percent, according to unofficial vote totals.

The defeat of Obama's chosen successor is being credited in great part to Kirk's support in the suburbs, to add to Republican support downstate and overcome Chicago's strongly Democratic vote.

Early Wednesday morning, Kirk and Dold greeted suburban commuters at Ogilvie Transportation Center in Chicago.

Asked if he has passed on any advice to his successor, Kirk said he told him to “first get some sleep and reconnect with your wife and kids and get ready next week to represent the 10th District.”

Aside from his plans to have a beer with Democratic opponent Alexi Giannoulias at Chicago's Billy Goat Tavern on Wednesday night, the 51-year-old Kirk revealed no personal plans of his own.

He said his staff is preparing to “transition as we begin to set up an operation to effectively represent 12 million people.”