WASHINGTON - As the new Senate opened for business yesterday, it offered more story lines than a nightly telenovela.
In one corner stood Sen. Joe Biden, who soon will resign his Senate seat to assume the vice presidency. Not far away sat Sen. John McCain, who lost to Biden and the man at the top of the ticket, President-elect and former Sen. Barack Obama.
On the other side of the room sat Sen. Hillary Clinton, vanquished by Obama in the Democratic primaries but now likely to leave the Senate soon to serve as his secretary of state. Close by sat Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman, almost tossed out of the Democratic caucus for his support of McCain.
If that wasn't enough, outgoing Vice President Dick Cheney presided over the opening session. He administered the oath of office for Biden.
But the drama inside the chamber was matched by events beyond it. Earlier in the day, Illinois' Roland Burris attempted to gain admittance to the Senate, but was turned away because of faulty paperwork - his own state's secretary of state refusing to certify the governor's appointment of Obama's replacement.
And while Senate Democrats have proclaimed political comedian Al Franken winner of a Senate seat in Minnesota in his extended battle with Republican incumbent Norm Coleman, they won't admit Franken until he, too, has a better legal claim on the post. He has won by a disputed 225 votes. Coleman said yesterday that he is suing to challenge Franken's apparent recount victory.
If Franken holds on, Democrats will have taken eight Senate seats away from Republicans, creating a commanding majority. This will increase pressure to deliver on legislation, something that became nearly impossible in the last Congress.
Both "parties learned an important lesson over the past two years," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, said yesterday. "When we allow ourselves to retreat into the tired, well-worn trenches of partisanship, when we fail to reach for common ground, when we are unable, in the words of President-elect Obama, to disagree without being disagreeable, we diminish our ability to accomplish real change."
The new Senate is far from settled in place.
New York's Senate seat will open up once Clinton resigns. Caroline Kennedy, niece of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, is a leading contender. If she isn't appointed by Gov. David A. Paterson, it could fall to another child of a famous political family, the state's attorney general, Andrew Cuomo.
