My Milestone Moment: 50 Years in Washington

How the city, the institutions, and the nation’s politics changed

Photo by Sogand Gh on Unsplash

(WASHINGTON, D.C.) — Happy New Year (at least I hope it will be soon) everybody, despite our president’s newly launched war and government take over in Venezuela, and his announced intention to steal Venezuela’s oil.

I’m going to get to the topic the headline on this column promises in a moment, but first, I have to share some thoughts about the late breaking news (as I write this column) about what Donald Trump just did in Venezuela.

How Trump’s invasion of Venezuela legally differs in any significant way from what Vladimir Putin is doing in Ukraine escapes me.

The wrecking ball, which Donald Trump wielded to destroy the White House East Wing to make room for his vanity ballroom is rapidly becoming the metaphor for his second term.

Just ask the artists and patrons who now flee from the once noble Kennedy Center in Washington, DC which Trump deeply soiled with his take over of it, politicization of it, and the vandalism of adding his own name to the living memorial to a slain President of the United States more than 60 years after his murder and who still enjoys the kind of popularity of which Trump - “Mr. Job Approval Ratings in the Toilet,” himself - can only dream.

Trump’s unconstitutional action in Venezuela is another roll out of the wrecking ball. This time wielded against the US Constitution, which gives the power to declare war to the US Congress alone - not to a rogue president. And certainly not to a draft dodging one who is now suddenly filled with the “courage” it takes to spill the blood of others.

The consequences of Trump’s latest attack on the Constitution will surely be swift and dangerous. The US has now sent the signal to other rogue nations that brutal military aggression, kidnapping heads of state, literally taking over a sovereign country and stealing its resources - in this case oil - are now OK, acceptable behavior for nations.

Iowa’s “Silent Six” congressional delegation finally found its voice - to support and applaud Trump’s lawlessness.

Article I Section 8 of the US. Constitution gives Congress the sole authority to authorize war against another country. Trump ignored it, and acted on his own.

Iowa’s “Silent Six” think that’s a great idea.

Article I Section 8 in the Constitution was supplemented by the War Powers Act in November 1973 over the veto of America’s other criminal president, Richard Nixon, whose crimes drove him from office but, pale in comparison to Trumps’s.

Trump ignored the War Powers Act, doing a complete end run around Congress whose bi-partisan leaders a president is legally required to at least inform and consult when emergency action is required and can’t wait for Congress to assemble and formally declare war.

Trump informed and consulted none of those leaders.

Iowa’s “Silent Six,” however, rushed to social media to applaud - like trained seals, barking their approval - for what the law and the Constitution clearly prohibit.

They disingenuously focused on the fact that the President of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro, is a very bad, criminal man. No one disputes that fact.

What is disputed, and should be vigorously disputed, is Trump’s idea that the United States can ignore our own laws, international law, and do on his own whim whatever Trump pleases to do to deal with Maduro whenever he wants.

There are laws that govern how nations deal with criminal heads of other states. Kidnapping and illegal, unauthorized invasions are not on that list.

Obeying our laws and international laws when it comes to dealing with criminal heads of state is what keeps nations from routinely invading other countries on their whims and from - routinely “whacking” the leaders - legitimate leaders or not - like they are in some organized crime gang war. The law is what keeps countries from routinely committing their own crimes that would only unleash violent, global chaos.

Frankly, I think Trump exposed himself to international war crimes prosecution, but we’ll let the legal experts litigate that one.

Trump - and the now suddenly vocal “Silent Six” - ignored the Constitution and the law.

By doing so, they made the world a more dangerous place.

But hey, at least we aren’t talking about the STILL unreleased Epstein files - are we - which may be part of the real motivation behind all this, anyway.

In 1776, future President John Adams said that America was a nation of “laws not men.”

Can that claim honestly and accurately be made today, under Trump, his Congress and his Republican Party of trained seals who mindlessly applaud his crimes? No.

Sadly, there will be more to say - lots more to say - about all of this in the weeks and months ahead.

Suffice it for now to say that America’s Commander in Chief - Cadet Bone Spurs himself - is drunk with the power he now has to order the nation’s military around and claim their courage as his own.

He is making America and the world less safe daily. So are Iowa’s “Silent Six” when they offer only partisan, unthinking approval that betrays this country’s laws, Constitution and values.

Which brings me to what started out as the topic of this week’s column but pretty much got crowded out by Trump’s unconstitutional and illegal attack on Venezuela just hours before filing time.

Allow me to give it at least a “drive by” mention.

My Milestone Moment: This wasn’t supposed to be an addendum, but here we are:

Before I close the book on 2025, I want to pause for a moment of “personal privilege” - as they say on the floor of the House and Senate - to note the significant milestone 2025 was for me.

It was the 50th anniversary of my professional arrival in Washington, DC where I continued my close up observation of the nation’s political process that began in Iowa when I was still a wet behind the ears cub reporter, still in high school, writing for the Dallas County News in Adel.

Before I came to Washington, I had a pretty good start watching the political process unfold.

I covered the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, and the protests and riots that surrounded it; I covered President Richard Nixon, Vice President Hubert Humphrey, Senators Everett Dirksen (R-IL), Robert F. Kennedy (D-NY), Ted Kennedy (D-MA), Eugene McCarthy (D-MN), Senator, future Vice President and future Democratic presidential nominee Walter Mondale (D-MN) and, of course, Iowa’s Bourke Hickenlooper, Jack Miller and future US Senator Roger Jepsen (R-IA). Also Governors Nelson Rockefeller (R-NY), George C. Wallace (D-AL), Lester Maddox (D-GA), the Governors of Kansas, North Dakota, and Missouri, and Iowa’s Robert Ray (R-IA) and Harold Hughes (D-IA)

Among others. Lots of others. And this was all before the Iowa Caucuses put Iowa on the national political map.

That list represents a wide range of political views and opinions, but I never doubted that those who held those differing views pursued them because they believed the path forward as they saw it would strengthen our country, our state, and our people.

A guy could honestly and accurately think that 50 years ago - even about people you thought were completely out to lunch. I learned that people could - and did - just have different views of what was best for America. Sometimes very different.

Layer on top of that, the opportunity to see how government policies actually played out at the local level for Iowa communities, workers, families, farmers, businesses and industries, and you can see the strength of the “big picture” I was able to see up close before I arrived in Washington, DC.

Add on 50 years of experience witnessing our government and politics at work “inside the belly of the beast” in the halls of the US House and Senate, and you get an idea of the place from which I now observe and write.

This is what I’m talking about when I say that my analysis and commentary here are informed by decades of close observation, and actual involvement, in the Iowa and national political process. And I haven’t even mentioned yet how senior level work in numerous House and Senate congressional campaigns, state political party work, and two presidential campaigns prepared me to see, really see, what’s going on in Washington, D.C..

The Washington, DC part of all that started 50 years ago.

I look back and realize there aren’t many that have had both the wide and deep view of our political process - and its results - that I have been privileged to experience. That’s a long time to be accumulating real time, real life, up close observations of how things work here - or more lately - how and why things don’t work here.

By the way, I do still consider it a privilege, as muddled and maddening as it all often gets these days. It helps to be able to see who and what is driving and motivating the now almost constant chaos. That’s what I try to share in this column. What’s happening and why.

At the risk of sounding like an old geezer, I’m going to say it any way: It hasn’t always been as maddening or as “messed up” as things are today. I’m glad I got to see it all when things still worked.

But make no mistake: There has always been discord in the Capitol.

Washington, DC is where our nation has always gathered to work out - sometimes fight out - America’s different opinions and views. It is where our elected representatives have worked to reconcile as much as they can in order to come up with compromises that work for everybody - but that frequently, nobody likes.

That is why people gather here - to let the “discord” out of the tires a bit, so to speak, in order to keep things rolling forward and on track for everyone.

It would be a mistake to believe otherwise and to pine away for some mythical time that never existed when everybody agreed with everybody. Those days never happened.

But it would also be a mistake to believe that finding compromises that work for everyone, even if nobody likes them, remains a goal for everyone in Washington, DC today. Sadly, it does not.

Too many hyper-partisans come here just to fight these days, with the “public good” not even on their agenda, but rather the “private good” comprising their entire agenda.

Partisan gain and advantage is the only goal for too many. And yes, Iowa’s trained partisan seal act in Congress - the “Silent Six” - I’m looking at you.

In 2015 I wrote that I was beginning to doubt whether the Republican Party - as it worked in Congress, any way - was even still committed to democracy in America or America’s Constitution.

I have seen precious little over the last few years to change my mind on that score.

That’s the greatest change I’ve seen in my 50 years in Washington, D.C.

Our national motto, E Pluribus Unum (Latin for “Out of many, one.”) seems to have been junked in favor of what often seems like endless, mindless tribal warfare.

It is absolutely worthwhile to ask ourselves how we let that happen.

It would be an even more helpful examination to figure out why we continue to allow it to happen.

When I first began to write this week’s column, I intended it to be a reflection on the changes I’ve seen in Washington, DC, the Congress, America’s democracy and political institutions over the 50 years.

As is often the case in the days of Trump 2.0, that topic was overtaken by events - a new scandal or outrage - that just a few years ago would have been career ending for even a president.

That his constant scandals have not been career ending for Trump is not testimony to his political skills and ability to survive what would have knocked previous presidents out of the game.

It is evidence of just how numb America has grown to his daily scandals, outrages and lawlessness.

Which has clearly been his strategy.

Someday, perhaps, I’ll have a chance to get back to ny observations about the other, smaller things that have changed in Washington since my arrival here 50 years ago. Let me know if you’d like me to try again.

Or maybe I’ll just have to finally finish writing that book.

But right now, what I want to say is this.

The greatest lesson I’ve learned in this town over the past 50 years is also the most urgent: Democracy and freedom require constant vigilance and ever active effort - not just by soldiers on foreign battle fields and other heroes, but by average citizens. Every one of us. Every day, Right here at home. Especially now.

Never, ever allow the unacceptable from our elected representatives to creep into the realm of the acceptable simply because it is takes too much of the work and effort required of every citizen in a democracy to save it.

To paraphrase Smokey the Bear: Remember - only you can prevent the destruction or theft of our democracy.

WEEKLY OVER-DUE FARM BILL TRACKER: DAY 826

Photo by Ginger Jordan on Unsplash

The five year federal Farm Bill - written and enacted back in 2018 - expired 826 days ago, as of Sunday, January 4, 2026.

The clock is still ticking for its replacement.

The Farm Bill is vital legislation for farmers. It sets the nation’s basic farm policies for five years. Knowing what federal farm policy is and is going to be is vital to planning family farm operations.

At this point, it is hard to interpret the failure by Congress to write a new Farm Bill - its deliberate choice to let federal farm policy simply wither on the vine, so to speak - for 826 days, as anything less than willful neglect.

There is no significant effort by Iowa’s “Silent Six” congressional delegation, individually or as a group, to move things along, even as Trump’s tariff policies and inflation continue to collapse the farm economy and threaten record levels of farm bankruptcies.

Four of Iowa’s “Silent Six” congressional delegation serve on either the House or Senate Agriculture Committee. Their silence and lack of effort enables this continued failure. They own it.

Remember their names: Senators Chuck Grassley (R-IA), Joni Ernst (R-IA), Zach Nunn (R- 3rd IA), and Randy Feenstra (R-4th IA).

Call or write them. They work for you. Remind them that while they may have forgotten about the Farm Bill, you haven’t forgotten that they forgot it. And you will remember that they forgot, too, about the family farmers who need a strong Farm Bill. Now. In fact, 826 days ago and still counting.

COMING ATTRACTIONS: PHOTOS FROM MY ARCHIVES

Barry Piatt Photo Archives

Over the next several weeks, I will be rolling out announcements here of new features I’m adding to this column in 2026. This week, I’m unveiling “Photos From My Archives.”

In my personal archives, I have numerous photographs from my early “reporter days” in Iowa. I will share many of them periodically with readers of this column, along with my brief recollections of the events surrounding the photographs.

As you can see in this pix, above, I started reporting on politics at a very young age. I am age 14 in this photograph.

That’s Governor Nelson Rockefeller (R-NY), left, and me, right, during a brief hallway interview at the Hotel Ft. Des Moines, in Des Moines, just days after Rockefeller’s April 30, 1968, announcement that he was running for the 1968 Republican presidential nomination.

The interview was really brief. It was more of a one or two question Q & A “walk and talk” interview. He was shaking hands and signing autographs as we walked.

My recollection is that he didn’t say anything I could really use in my story.

For Iowans who were active - or at least paying attention to politics in those days - you’re really going to like this series, I think. You’ll not only likely spot some folks you may know, but the series is an historically significant one. It captures Iowa and national political figures campaigning in Iowa in the days before the Iowa Caucuses put the state on the national political map.

This series will not be paywalled, but will be available to all. It will appear periodically, rather than on a regular schedule, however, so becoming a subscriber is the best way to ensure you don’t miss a single “Photos From My Archives” installment.

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