We have once again entered an era of power sharing in the federal government, as the first session of the 112th United States Congress is officially underway. Yes, the Senate is still in the hands of the Democrats, though not by the majority they once had, but the House of Representatives is now solidly in the hands of the Republicans, and it is from this chamber the GOP expects to launch its counter offensives.
The first thing on the agenda for the new Speaker of the House, John Boehner, is the repeal of Obamacare, or more properly, the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Well, the GOP was never a great believer in the need for healthcare reform, and certainly not in this effort to reform it, as not a single member of the GOP in either the House or Senate voted in favor of it.
The bill became law, but only as a result of some clever parliamentary maneuvering by the Obama Administration and the Democrats from the 111th Congress. The death of Ted Kennedy and the loss of his seat to the GOP gave the Republicans the means to prevent the passage of the bill through normal procedures.
In the Senate, unlike the House, there is no limit on the amount of debate that can take place prior to voting on a proposed bill. In effect, a bill can be talked to death, and this procedure, called a filibuster, can only be broken if there are 60 votes to cut off debate.
To keep the healthcare bill from meeting such a fate in any re-votes in the Senate after a rewrite of the healthcare bill by a conference committee, the House met and passed the Senate version of the bill. The differences in the two original bills were then ironed out in a process called reconciliation, where a simple majority is all that is required in the Senate. In the end, President Obama accomplished what no President before him was able to, and that was to get healthcare reform passed.
The off-year election that saw the Republicans reclaim the majority in the House of Representatives was won by candidates who ran on the idea of repealing Healthcare reform, and since they do have the numbers, no one doubts that repeal will pass in the House.
It is in the Senate this effort is expected to be derailed. Because of the filibuster, the GOP would need 60 votes to even bring the bill up for a vote. And even if the Senate somehow voted to bring the bill up for a vote, and even if, by some miracle, got enough votes to pass it, it would then face a certain veto by President Obama.
Still the vote will take place in the House of Representatives. It is a token bill doomed to failure, but the GOP feels it is a step that must be taken. Let us hope it is the last such bill introduced.
Compromise must now become the watchword. If this means Republicans and Democrats must accept what they would have earlier rejected out of hand, so be it. This is the only way either party will be able to convince the voters in 2012 that it had their best interest at heart.
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Good post. I think the corporate media has done a fantastic job of distracting the American public from what is important to what is emotionally stimulating (crime, violence, fear, greed, 'reality tv', etc.). One of the outcomes is that most people have forgotten or have not been taught that our representative democracy form of government was created to solve our common problems. Every two years we have the right to overthrow our government if we are not happy with the choices our representatives make on our behalf. The government is not some ephemeral entity to look upon with disdain and mistrust. We are our government and we are responsible when it is not functioning the way it is supposed to. For example, I think we would all agree that corporate money is a bad influence on how our government operates. We could insist on public campaign finance reform. 'We the People' own the airwaves, i.e., they are part of the public domain so we can dole out specific time for campaign ads free to each candidate that receives support via petition of a certain percentage of registered voters for a specific elected office. We can shorten the campaign cycle to one month before election instead to 1-1/2 to 2 years like it is becoming. We can solve this and other common problems if we have three things: knowledge the problem exists, knowledge of viable solutions, the will to act.
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