Party ties aside, bill unites two senators

By Bob Keefe

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

One is a wealthy Republican, a genteel Georgian who has spent more than three decades in politics at almost every level.

Enlarge photo

CLIFF OWEN, STR Senator Al Franken (D-MN) takes the oath during his swearing-in in the Old Senate Chambers of the U.S. Capitol July 7, 2009, in Washington, D.C.

Enlarge photo

Kimberly Smith, staff / ksmith@ajc.com Sen. Johnny Isakson, left, announces he'll run for a second term in the US Senate as his colleague Sen. Saxby Chambliss stands in the background.

More Atlanta area news »

• Beryl may bring rain, wind here
• Suicide call leads to pot bust
• Not all cheating the same at APS
• Sneiderman battle recalls 1989 saga

The other is an upstart Democrat, a mordant Minnesotan who has been in public office for a little more than three weeks.

Yet when comedian-turned-freshman U.S. Sen. Al Franken was looking for a lead co-sponsor for his first piece of legislation — a bill to provide service dogs to disabled veterans — he somewhat naturally turned to Georgia Republican U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson.

In these times of partisan politics, it can seem strange for a Republican like Isakson to co-sponsor legislation with a liberal Democrat — especially one who has called Republicans “jerks,” “liars” and other unflattering epithets in books and commentaries.

But for Isakson, helping Franken with his first bill had nothing to do with politics and everything to do with principle.

Franken wanted to introduce a bill that would create a $1.25 million pilot program to train and deploy at least 200 service dogs to aid in the treatment of disabled veterans. He got the idea after meeting a former military intelligence officer suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder who had a service dog he characterized as invaluable.

Further research by Franken found that service dogs are hard to come by — costing some private agencies as much as $25,000 each to train and place.

As a member of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee, Isakson seemed like a natural enough co-sponsor for the bill, even if he was a Republican and even if he was a supporter and friend of Franken’s political rival, former Sen. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.). But Isakson also has firsthand knowledge of the therapeutic benefits of service dogs.

Before Isakson’s mother, Julia, died of Alzheimer’s disease in 1998, one of the few things that brought her noticeable joy was her interaction with service dogs at an Alzheimer’s facility where she spent her last years.

“It was really something watching how the animal and my mom responded to each other,” said Isakson, who lives in Cobb County. Especially, he added, since his mother had never liked dogs before.

Isakson said he wasn’t sure why Franken sought him out as a co-sponsor of what was to become the Franken-Isakson Service Dogs for Veterans Act before it was wrapped into the 2010 defense appropriations bill that passed the Senate last week.

But Isakson said he’s happy he did, even if it might rub some of his more conservative Republican colleagues the wrong way. “Up here, the name of the game is to make a difference in the lives of people,” Isakson said. “I make my judgments based on that, not on politics.”

For his part, Franken said through a spokeswoman that he had been looking forward to working with colleagues on both sides of the political aisle and was pleased it worked out for his first piece of legislation.

And maybe he learned something from it.

“I’ve been a senator for only a few days,” Franken wrote recently in The Minneapolis Star-Tribune. “But I’ve learned it’s better to listen than to talk ... and that I enjoy working with my Republican colleagues as much as I do with my fellow Democrats.”

But don’t think that the seasoned gentleman from Georgia is serving as any sort of mentor for the newbie Franken.

“I don’t think he’d say I’m his [mentor],” Isakson said. “And I would never say he’s mine.”