This is starting to look familiar.
We have a secret bill brought forth early from a new Congress, massive protests at congressmen’s and senators’ town halls and a largely politically-unknown president looking to leave a legacy.
The parallels between 2009 and 2017 are starting to become alarmingly similar. In 2009 we had the nebulous creation of the Affordable Care Act, and now we have the shrouded formulation of a Republican bill to replace it.
This week provided the largest disappointment the new Congress has given us yet: keeping a healthcare bill in secret in order to hide the drafting process from the people.
When the House leadership did reveal its Obamacare replacement bill, it was equally disappointing.
If the GOP is to retain the historic levels of control it has in Congress and the states, it must hold itself to a higher standard. The Republican party has been entrusted by the American people to right the wrongs and fix the excesses of the Obama years.
Republicans in Congress must practice transparency and fulfill their major promises from the election, otherwise they will deserve the losses they are sure to suffer in 2018 and beyond.
Political website Talking Points Memo quotes Michael Needham, CEO of Heritage’s activist organization as remarking that the bill “not only accepts the flawed progressive premises of Obamacare but expands upon them.”
The bill keeps healthcare subsidies, offering them in the form of tax credits and retains the individual mandate in spirit with continuous coverage requirements.
The president and many members of Congress promised us they full repeal and replace Obamacare if they were elected. This has been a rallying cry of the right since the Tea Party movement.
If the GOP backs away from this now, it will be a fundamental betrayal of their voters.
I may never vote Democrat, but there are looking to be more and more Republicans I would not support either.
Certain members of the party get it. All weekend, Rand Paul R-KY organized a public campaign with his staffers and Democrats across Washington, D.C., to humorously look for the bill.
Paul was denied the ability to view the bill, and he tweeted that his staff was “continuing (thier) search” to find it in a scavenger hunt-esque joke.
This worked to simultaneously raise awareness of how House leadership had cut the American people out of deciding how 18 percent of their economy will be run and to highlight Paul’s own replacement bill, one conservative groups are much more excited about.
This sort of intelligent publicity stunt and devotion to electoral promises would serve the GOP well.
Fortunes in politics, as in poker, change quickly. Republicans are holding most of the chips right now, but that is far from a guarantee of future success.
One does not have to look back too many years to see the self-assured pronouncements from the left about the “permanent electoral majority” that Obama had assembled.
The Republican party must hold itself to a higher standard than the “pass it to find out what is in it” Democrats held themselves to under Nancy Pelosi. The American people sent historic numbers of Republicans to D.C., to fulfill eight years of promises. Time to get to it.
zaochamb@umail.iu.edu
