Win This Fall, Save the Country Later
Thursday, February 11th, 2010
by Jaren Love
This past week, Politics Daily editor Melinda Henneberger had a piece titled “Where’s Our Stephen Douglas?” The piece describes how Stephen Douglas, even after losing the Presidential race to Abraham Lincoln, broke ranks with many in his Democratic party’s southern stronghold to rally them to stay in the union to avoid a civil war. In fact, Stephen Douglas even died at the young age of 48 pursuing that cause. Such an act of political courage seems unheard of in the contemporary climate of American politics with a Republican party that finds obstruction to be the most politically expedient means of operating and a moderate faction of the Democratic party that cares more about re-election than doing what is right for the American people. And since the election of Republican Scott Brown to the United States Senate, health care will probably be ignored for another generation after he has vowed to be the 41st vote against the bill (despite the fact that the legislation is almost identical to a law he voted for in the Massachusetts State Senate just a few years ago).
When John McCain lost his election bid for President in the fall of 2008 to Barack Obama, his concession speech was a speech of unity and emphasized the country coming together to work against the challenges of the times. However, as soon as he found out he had radio host and former congressman J.D. Hayworth as a conservative Republican primary challenger, he has moved sharply to the right and has been completely ineffective in helping bridge the divide in Washington. McCain, once deemed a champion of the environment, has pretty much abandoned his willingness to work with the Democrats and his Republican colleague Lindsey Graham in addressing climate change this year. Basically, when it was politically expedient in 2008 to distance himself from eight years of failed Republican rule, John McCain was a “maverick.” Now that the American people have been terribly impatient with the new rule of the Democratic Party and now that John McCain has a right wing challenger sympathetic to the tea party movement, suddenly his “principles” lie to the far right.
John McCain’s actions are pretty reflective of the legislative branch of the United States as a whole. This entire branch of government has been terribly ineffective in the Obama era. The Republicans have threatened to filibuster any ambitious Democratic legislation and have branded the mostly market based solution as socialism. The more moderate Democrats such as Ben Nelson and Independent Joe Lieberman have casted votes toward health care reform nearly kicking and screaming. The fact still remains that nearly 47 million people lack health insurance in the United States and that the United States is one of the few countries in the developed world to lack universal care. Despite this fact and that there is a reasonable bill being offered that provides a market based approached to solving the problem, many of our legislators lack the political courage to stand up for what is right. The unfortunate truth is the Republicans just want to win this fall and they probably can win on a platform of saying “no.”
The attitude of the Republican Party can be summarized from the President’s State of the Union address where he directly referenced the many tax cuts that have been brought about by his administration. The Republican side of the aisle sat on their hands during this part of the speech despite the fact that they claim to love tax cuts more than a recently dumped college girl loves chocolate ice cream. Obstructionism is now the norm. Unfortunately, the Republicans have viewed the election of Scott Brown as a referendum on their governing (or lack thereof) in Washington and will probably continue to follow suit as we watch another year go by of so many American problems left unfixed. With the Democrats lacking a 60 vote supermajority to defect the Republican abuse of the filibuster, we can expect a year full of ineffective governance.
Some simply write this off as politicians being politicians and try to ignore the process all together. The problem is that we have real problems. The health insurance issue is probably one of the biggest. The blog ThinkProgress recently reported two stories about abuses of health care insurers. One story chronicles a 6 year old girl being denied a hearing implant to help save her from going deaf, and another of a 5 year old boy being denied emergency cancer treatment. Yet the tea baggers keep waving the signs and Fox News keeps blaring its deception scaring the public of big government when really this is all about what is right and wrong. What is so sacred about upholding free enterprise when free enterprise is forcing a 6 year old girl to go deaf and a 5 year old boy to be denied cancer treatment? Where is our courageous respected politician from the opposing party to stand up for what is right? Can something like the actions of Stephen Douglas following his defeat by Abraham Lincoln in the 1860 election exist in this era of politicians worrying more about career preservation than the public’s interest?
If the Massachusetts Senate race is any indication of what will happen this fall, the Republicans will probably win big. They will be able to continue their agenda of tax breaks for the wealthy, starting wars, helping big business, and of course not addressing our health care problem. Health care has never been a priority of the party and will probably be ignored with more and more Americans forced to go to the emergency room for poison ivy and head colds. And as Melinda Henneberger pointed out in her piece, we will wait for a Stephen Douglas to come, a well respected politician on the other side of the aisle who can look past a “D” or an “R” and be more interested in what is “right” and “wrong.”









