Building bridges, across rivers and party lines

Concord Monitor, Op-Ed

President Joe Biden visited New Hampshire last week to tout the signing of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Framework with a speech delivered from the NH 175 bridge, a piece of infrastructure that has needed repairs since 2014.

The bridge made for a perfect photo backdrop and allowed New Hampshire’s all- Democrat Congressional delegation to demonstrate their ability to “bring home the bacon.” Ironically, the delegation’s comments about the “overdue” nature of the fix failed to note that the delegation consisted of two three-term governors, a two-term vice president and current president and almost dozens of years in the U.S. Senate.

Sure, there are lots of reasons for the bridge’s condition, but it’s worth noting that the group was at least partially responsible for the delays they highlighted.

Don’t get me wrong, the infrastructure deal is big news. America’s infrastructure has been crumbling for decades, while other countries, including China, have been investing in building up their own. The hundreds of billions of dollars in domestic investments, including $40 billion in critical bridge repairs and replacements, will go a long way in bringing America back to leading the world in physical connectivity.

And while it’s easy to find faults with the bill (Why does New Hampshire get the fewest dollars for highway improvement? What impact will infrastructure spending have on already rising prices? Surely, it will further stoke the inflation fire, right? Is it being funded fairly?), it’s worth zooming out to note the obvious. The bill is not perfect, and I have many concerns about how the money will be spent, but it is law, and the nation does need better infrastructure.

Last year, I wrote a book called Think For Yourself: Restoring Common Sense in an Age of Experts and Artificial Intelligence. In it, I note that every perspective is

limited, every perspective is biased and every perspective is incomplete. The solution to these issues is to employ multiple perspectives and viewpoints. In political parlance, my message is a call for bipartisanship. (By the way, if there were three parties, I’d be calling for tripartisanship!)

And while it’s easy to call for aisle-crossing, selfless promotion of national interests over individual objectives, achieving such bipartisan progress is by no means pretty. In this case, Democrats and Republicans came together to write a relatively centrist, pragmatic and bipartisan piece of legislation that invests in America. (It’s important to note that investments generate returns, and the infrastructure bill should increase the nation’s economic capacity. I contrast this with social spending (i.e. “handouts”) that does little to improve an economy’s potential.)

Building bridges is, however, easier than bridging partisanship. Many Americans feel Washington D.C. is stuck in a gridlock of our own making. I recently re-

watched Charlie Wilson’s War and couldn’t help but chuckle when Julia Roberts asks Tom Hanks, “Why is Congress saying one thing and doing nothing?” to which Hanks replies, “Tradition, mostly.”

Moving from Hollywood to the Granite State, however, is not as big a jump as meets the eye. Gov. Chris Sununu, who opted not to run in the upcoming U.S. Senate race, recently noted that “unfortunately, on both sides of the aisle, doing nothing is a win.”

Sununu went further, stating that “there needs to be a fundamental change in philosophy on both sides of the aisle to simply start getting stuff done….because if everything is a party-line test, then nothing’s ever going to get done.”

I couldn’t agree more. And given the pressures facing many American families — rising prices at the register and pump, supply chain and labor shortages, and ongoing disruptions due to the pandemic, to name but a few — voters from the Redwood Forests to the Gulf Stream waters (as well as in our state) deserve action.

We need to put partisan issues aside. Our country doesn’t need more tax cuts for the wealthiest one percent, nor does it need to cut funding for police departments. It doesn’t need to teach our kids that America is inherently evil or to ignore our long and troubled history. What America needs is common sense. It needs to focus on the things that matter and to make progress towards improving the lives of all Americans.

I was pleased to hear Senator (and former governor) Jeanne Shaheen highlight her efforts at crossing the aisle to work with Republican senators Mitt Romney and Susan Collins on the infrastructure bill. We need more of this. Breaking the partisanship gridlock is also our country’s best chance at tackling what I believe is the single most pressing geopolitical challenge of the century: our rapidly intensifying rivalry with China.

Even domains thought to be of mutual interest, such as climate change mitigation and pandemic management, are proving to be competitive. The Uyghur genocide taking place in Chinese occupied East Turkestan may emerge as a global flashpoint as the Olympics shines a spotlight on the issue. And as Taiwan’s status is increasingly uncertain, it is increasingly obvious that we are fighting a war of values.

The challenges ahead were on full display earlier this week as President Biden’s conversation with China’s Xi failed to produce anything meaningful. Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo recently noted that China doesn’t see us as competition, they see us as an adversary. He suggested we do the same.

This past summer, the United States Senate passed the United States Innovation and Competition Act (USICA), formerly known as the Endless Frontiers Act, a bipartisan, multi-faceted, and comprehensive piece of legislation that seeks to bolster America’s strategic approach to China.

USICA includes billions of dollars for research and development, semiconductors, supply chain resiliency and a renewed diplomatic strategy for the Indo-Pacific with an increased emphasis on our allies and partners. The bill is a positive step towards developing American capabilities and countering potential Chinese aggressiveness.

It’s an investment that will pay dividends for decades and decades to come.

I’m reminded that Ronald Reagan once asked Mikhail Gorbachev if America and Russia could put aside the many intractable differences in the relationship if the world was ever invaded by aliens. Gorbachev agreed. I’d pose the same question to Democrats and Republicans, albeit updated for our current day dilemma.

Can’t we put aside our differences and focus on the challenge at hand?

Right now, the USICA bill is stalled in the House of Representatives, but Congress can and should immediately break this bottleneck. We need to send the legislation to the president for his signature ASAP. There is no time to waste on narrow partisan politics when it comes to competing and confronting China. Beijing certainly isn’t wasting any time.

(Vikram Mansharamani lives in Lincoln and teaches a class about the world’s toughest problems to undergraduates at Harvard University.)