Tom Harkin: “first let me thank my friend and colleague for his lifetime characteristic which is being very gracious and very…”

“first let me thank my friend and colleague for his lifetime characteristic which is being very gracious and very generous in his remarks. Chuck Grassley and I have served together since 1974. I like to tell people that in 1974, that was a big wave of Democrats who came in. They called us the Watergate babies. We came in a big wave, won a lot of elections. In fact in Iowa that year they elected a Democratic U.S. Senator and every House seat--I think there were six at that time--six House seats all went Democratic except one, and that was the seat that Chuck Grassley won that year, bucking the trend--the tide--in 1974. So it is kind of a funny thing, Chuck,--I speak to my friend across the aisle here--that a lot of times people, this year, have said, ``All you Watergate babies are gone now, you and Max Baucus, and Chris Dodd and on the House side George Miller and Henry Waxman. So this is the last of the Watergate babies.'' I said, ``No, there is one left.'' ``Well, who is that,'' they say. I say, ``It is a Republican.'' ``A Republican? Who is that?'' I say, ``My colleague from Iowa, Chuck Grassley, is sort of, shall I say, the last man standing from that class of 1974.'' Again, it is a tribute to Senator Grassley that through all these years he has won the hearts and minds of the people of Iowa, been elected and reelected. Of course he came to the Senate before I did. He came in 1981 and I came in 1984.…”