Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) wins the prize for being the first member of the 112th Congress to speak the word “manufacturing” on the chamber floor, mentioning it in Wednesday’s speeches praising Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) for becoming the longest-serving woman member of the Senate. From page S10 of The Congressional Record:

I have been a proud partner with her on making commonsense changes to our Nation’s immigration system. She also has been a strong advocate for Federal programs that promote manufacturing, such as the Commerce Department’s Manufacturing Extension Program and the Technology Innovation Program.

On the House side, the first mention of the word “manufacture” came Thursday in a special order speech by Rep. Steve Pearce (R-NM), who returns to the Congress after serving three terms last decade. In his remarks entitled, “Issues Facing the 112th Congress,” Pearce talked about the Gulf of Mexico oil spill:

the Obama administration implemented a moratorium, and that moratorium shut down the drilling offshore. We have 33 deepwater platforms. Those deepwater platforms cost billions to make, sometimes 15 years to manufacture them, and we have now shut them down; no economic activity at all.

Now, any business will tell you that they’ve got to have revenue from their investment. And so now then those deepwater rigs are beginning to steam away at about two or three knots per hour to foreign countries. Some have already gone to Africa, South America; and those jobs will never occur offshore in the U.S. again. I think that that’s an over-response from the Obama administration, and I believe that one of the things this Congress should do is pull the pendulum back to the middle.

We will not cotinue this exercise, looking for the first mention of the word “manufacturing” in other contexts. It doesn’t seem that informative as a measure of Congress’ attention to the economy and the manufacturing sector.

Senator Mark Warner (D-VA), speaking today to the National Association of Manufacturers, at the “Leadership Luncheon”:

At a time when innovation is the driving force of how we grow economies worldwide, science, research and development have to be at the top of our agenda. Unfortunately, we’ve seen R&D funding in the United States fall to sixth in the world in terms of the percentage of our GDP. Sixth is not high enough. Again, if you look at historic numbers, post WWII, America has always led in its R&D efforts. We’ve seen those efforts cut back in terms of …it’s too often easy enough to cut those efforts in the short term, in the long term we will pay for those cutbacks.

What do we need? Well, we do need more federal efforts in R&D. That does NOT mean that the federal government should be picking technology winners and losers. That should be left to the marketplace. But in terms of basic research the federal government, I believe, should play an increasingly important role.

By coincidence, Newt Gingrich on NPR’s “Morning Edition” this morning:

There are smart things the government should do. I favor, for example, doubling the size of the National Science Foundation. I think it’s absolutely imperative that we make the investment to remain the world’s leader in science and technology.

Senator Warner’s remarks on technologry and R&D were cited in an NAM news release today, “SENATOR WARNER (D-VA) SHARES WITH MANUFACTURERS HIS VISION FOR STRENGTHENING AMERICA’S COMPETITIVENESS.”

From Senator Warner’s remarks today to the NAM:

Trade: You see from both the left and the right a growing resistance to the internationalization of our markets. We cannot retreat back from this global economy. We’ve got to have rules of the road, and those rules have to be enforced, but we must make sure that America is fully integrated into the global economy.

UPDATE: (4:15 p.m.): Senator Warner mentioned his recently announced committee assignments: Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs; and Commerce, Science and Transportation. The Washington Post has all the Democratic assignments, with assignments still awaiting the newly arriving ones: Burris, Begich and the Minnesota Senator.

The National Association of Manufacturers held its Leadership Luncheon next door at the JW Marriott today as part of the Inauguration celebrations. Virginia’s new U.S. senator, Senator Mark Warner, was our guest speaker, and he was generous with his time and his insights.

Warner gave a fine speech on building U.S. competitiveness, focusing on innovation, education and workforce issues. On several issues — trade, energy, visas for critical foreign employees — he made clear, concise statements about political principles and policies that are entirely consistent with the NAM’s priorities. (We’ll post those later this afternoon.)

In response to the first question about how business should approach the new Congress, Senator Warner went on at some length, identifying areas where he thought business had come up short and needed to do some repair work. (We’d guess this is the news that the reporters will highlight.) Warner:

My biggest single take-away from this last campaign, more than any particular issue, was, I think the American people have had a fundamental break in trust with the business community.

The public is angry about executive compensation, and business would be wise to work to restore that trust through collaboration rather than immediate rejection of policy proposals, he argued.

Sometimes when a politician makes comments along these lines, it’s really a veiled message to the audience  to not ever criticize the speaker, ever. But we absolutely did not get that sense from the Senator. His tone was conversational, his observations constructive, and the audience appeared to take them in the spirit they were intended.

But they did seem newsy…(.mp3 file here.)

My biggest single take-away from this last campaign, more than any particular issue, was, I think the American people have had a fundamental break in trust with the business community. I know that may not be a popular way to start the day before this inaugural…. We can all point to certain excesses, whether it’s on Wall Street, whether it’s on some of the corporate CEO parachute packages, and my fear is that this break in trust desperately needs to be repaired, because it’s critically important that the American people believe in the honesty and integrity of our business community and the free enterprise system.

But I warn, I would argue, that this break in trust will not simply be repaired as the economy recovers, if the Dow is back at 14,000. ….I think that three areas where I would love to see, because it’s a bigger question than just how you deal with the Democratic Congress.

(continue reading…)

As part of the National Association of Manufacturers’ events commemorating the inauguration of President Barack Obama, on Monday the NAM is sponsoring a lunch at the Ronald Reagan Building just across Pennsylvania Avenue from NAM HQ.

We’re pleased to report that Senator Mark Warner (D-VA), just elected to replace the retiring Senator John Warner, will be speaking at the lunch attended by representatives of NAM member companies and their guests.

Senator Warner comes from a business background and supported pro-investment policies during his four years as governor of Virginia, so NAM members are looking forward to hearing his insights about the new Congress and the incoming Obama Administration.

For more, see the NAM’s online inaugural information is here.

Polls in Virginia, Georgia, South Carolina, Vermont, and parts of Indiana and Kentucky are now closed.

Mark Warner has been projected as the winner of the Virginia Senate race.  Democrats are plus one.  Mark Warner is a pro-business Democrat who has extended an open door policy to the NAM and will be good to work with.

The Hill reports from a breakfast of Virginia delegates at the Democratic National Convention in Denver, where first-term Sen. Jim Webb was the guest speaker:

“One of the great mistakes that we made in terms of political strategy before we broke for this latest recess was not taking on the Republican Party when they started talking about offshore drilling,” Webb said.

“I believe that our leadership made a very bad mistake. I don’t think we should run from that issue. I think we should say, ‘Let’s find out what’s out there. Let’s explore.’ Then you can have the debate about whether environmentally it’s worth drilling,” he added.

Virginia’s elected officials of both political parties have shown a refreshing willingness to consider OCS drilling off the state’s coast. Former Gov. Mark Warner (D-VA) spoke to Grist, the online environmental magazine/news service, the other day and addressed the issue.

Where I might differ from some in the environmental community [is] I really think as a national price issue, you’ve got to have a whole portfolio. I think it’s solar. I think it’s wind. I think it’s biofuels, although I think the idea of the government trying to pick a winner the way we did with corn-based ethanol is not the right approach. I think you’ve got to continue the research for carbon capture and sequestration for coal. You have to take a fresh look at nuclear. I think [it should include] conservation in the grid. I even think that as part of a comprehensive approach you’ve got to [have] increased domestic [oil] production, including lifting the congressional moratorium on [offshore] drilling, as long as states can still do it in an environmentally friendly way, since the technology around the rigs has dramatically improved. You still have transport issues, but in terms of the rigs themselves they’re much better.

And …

I think there are clearly less issues around natural gas in terms of safety issues than there are around oil, but if we are going to find oil, and it’s sufficiently offshore in the 50-mile range, and it can be shown that it’s done in a safe way, then I think it ought to be part of the mix. We’ve seen even post-Katrina there was not a dramatic challenge with the rigs. There were some problems in terms of transporting the fuel, but there weren’t problems with the rigs.

The willingness of these Democrats to disagree with their party’s Congressional leadership is the interesting political development. For the sake of fairness, though, we should also note that former Virginia Republican Gov. Jim Gilmore, running against Warner for the U.S. Senate, has made energy development a key component of his campaign.

UPDATE (noon): And at the Republican Platform Committee, House Minority Leader John Boehner stops by to promote domestic energy production. From National Review Online: “Our members have been on the floor for three weeks waiting for Nancy Pelosi to call Congress back into session to vote on our all-of-the-above energy plan,” he said. “When we get back in September, this issue is not going away.”

(Note: NAM’s Executive Vice President Jay Timmons is blogging from the National Democratic Convention in Denver this week.)

Every seat in the house was taken and my colleague, Tiffany Adams, and I were very happy to have good seats tonight

Hillary Clinton will take center stage soon, but the highlight for the business community was the keynote speaker – former Virginia Governor Mark Warner.

Governor Warner is the face of the future for the Democrats. As Virginia’s Chief Executive he reached out to non-traditional allies, across party lines, always with an eye to improving the state’s economic environment.

“The Race for the Future is on,” he declared in his speech. (Speech available here.) To be sure, the good Governor delivered a few partisan applause lines. But his inclusive style and his nod to key NAM issues such as advances in technology and increased domestic energy supply, Mark Warner is a leader the business community can work with.

From the polls in Virginia, Mark Warner is likely to succeed Senator John Warner (no relation) upon John’s retirement this year. If he is, indeed, successful, the NAM will look forward to working closely with him to advance common sense public policies that will advance the cause of manufacturing and create quality high-paying jobs for Americans.

Jim Geraghty at National Review’s The Campaign Spot posts the list of speakers at the Democratic convention in Denver and observes…

Looking over the complete list of speakers at the Democratic convention, I note… that there is not a single businessman, entrepreneur, or private sector innovator speaking in the entire four nights, barring some last-minute addition.

Groups represented include the SEIU, the NEA, AFT, NARAL and Planned Parenthood. But not one representative of any company – just politicians, representatives of unions, and leaders of abortion groups. (I suppose some wag will say that Al Gore counts, as the innovative inventor of the Internet and creator of that television channel.)

By comparison, the GOP convention features EBay CEO Meg Whitman and former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina. And this isn’t even counting Mitt Romney, co-founder of Bain Capital.

UPDATE: I’ll give a little credit where it’s due, Mark Warner makes the cut as well as Romney does —  former managing director of Columbia Capital Corporation, early investor in Nextel, founder of a large technology-based venture capital fund… 

We’d guess there will be businessmen and women added. It’s too obvious an oversight not to.

And from the Communications Workers of America:

Two of CWA’s key policy goals – Employee Free Choice and a national broadband strategy – are part of the Democratic platform that will be presented to next week’s national party convention in Denver.

In the plank devoted to “Good Jobs with Good Pay,” the central point is the right to organize and bargain collectively: “We know that when unions are allowed to do their job of making sure that workers get their fair share, they pull people out of poverty and create a stronger middle class.” The platform pledges: “We will strengthen the ability of workers to organize unions and fight to pass the Employee Free Choice Act.”

Frank Wagner is a Virginia state Senator from Virginia Beach, co-owner and executive vice president of
Davis Boat Works, Inc., and an NAM board member. And a visionary when it comes to energy development and the state’s economic future:

Wagner introduced a bill for next week’s transportation special session that would allocate 40 percent of any oil and gas royalties from drilling off Virginia’s coast to transportation needs. He said experts estimate those royalties would be worth $200 million a year, so his plan would devote $80 million a year to transportation.

Meanwhile, Delegate Chris Saxman has proposed allocating the entire revenue stream to transportation.  

Allocation of revenues is a matter best left to the state legislators and voters, of course, but the entire nation needs the energy.

Energy has also emerged as a top issue in the U.S. Senate race in Virginia between two former Governors, Democrat Mark Warner and Republican Jim Gilmore. Warner wants to crack down on speculators, and Gilmore wants to increase supply.