The Chickens Are Coming Home To Roost
The last twenty four years in politics have been so contentious, divisive, and ideological that I believe the folks we have elected to office don't want to compromise like they need to in order for the system to work and even more sadly they have lost the skills necessary to compromise.
The health care debate is a textbook example of this. The Republican Party lined up against President Obama. The mantra has been "repeal Obamacare" that was passed with virtually no Republican support through a Democratic maneuver called "reconciliation", which allowed the passage with only Democrats voting for the legislation.
The ACA or Obamacare was passed in 2010 before the mid term elections and as per history the Democrats lost control of the House of Representatives. Since then hardly anything has happened politically or in policy.
The 112th, 113th, and 114th Congresses succeeded in doing not much more than keeping the government running. Congress has been held in disrepute with record levels of disapproval. Of course, except for each individual Congressional district where the Member may not be wildly popular but because gerrymandering is almost impossible to replace.
At the end of six years of failure to work together, compromise, and even more division, the infrastructure isn't improving(you might think this is a bipartisan issue).
Repeal and Replace doesn't draw hardly any bi-partisan ideas even though both political parties admit the country's health care system needs both parties to work together before even more damage is done to "the health care system". It is a big chunk of the economy and I don't think health issues everyone will face split along party lines.
Security at home, better jobs, and immigration reform, the environment and issues of war and peace all scream for Democrats and Republicans to work together.
We may have only succeeded in electing a president that has little political capital to move the reluctant ones in his party and scares those of the other party away from compromise to imitate earlier strategies of resistance at all costs.
The health care debate is a textbook example of this. The Republican Party lined up against President Obama. The mantra has been "repeal Obamacare" that was passed with virtually no Republican support through a Democratic maneuver called "reconciliation", which allowed the passage with only Democrats voting for the legislation.
The ACA or Obamacare was passed in 2010 before the mid term elections and as per history the Democrats lost control of the House of Representatives. Since then hardly anything has happened politically or in policy.
The 112th, 113th, and 114th Congresses succeeded in doing not much more than keeping the government running. Congress has been held in disrepute with record levels of disapproval. Of course, except for each individual Congressional district where the Member may not be wildly popular but because gerrymandering is almost impossible to replace.
At the end of six years of failure to work together, compromise, and even more division, the infrastructure isn't improving(you might think this is a bipartisan issue).
Repeal and Replace doesn't draw hardly any bi-partisan ideas even though both political parties admit the country's health care system needs both parties to work together before even more damage is done to "the health care system". It is a big chunk of the economy and I don't think health issues everyone will face split along party lines.
Security at home, better jobs, and immigration reform, the environment and issues of war and peace all scream for Democrats and Republicans to work together.
We may have only succeeded in electing a president that has little political capital to move the reluctant ones in his party and scares those of the other party away from compromise to imitate earlier strategies of resistance at all costs.
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