mrstickball said:
If this is in imperfect bill, then they need to make it perfect - after all, isn't it our senators jobs to make good bills law? The way they passed this - by giving out favors to those that questioned the bill - is horrible. As much as I would like to say the current administration has some iota of worthiness to it, I do not believe it does. We do need healthcare reform, but this kind of 'reform' is a sham - we're funding a bad system for more people, rather than passing laws to make the system better, THEN looking into giving it to everyone. |
While I agree with the majority of what you're saying I don't think perfection is a reasonable requirement for legislation (or really even defineable). I do agree however, and I think you probably meant this, that they should be striving for perfection when crafting their legislation.
As for the bill itself, I would find it comical if it weren't so awful. At this point it is pretty well understood that they are passing something just to have something, and I mean anything at all, passed. They are selling out what they obviously understand to be a problem that needs a serious legislative solution to the political needs of their president and their party.
The only thing the bill does that actually meets a campaign goal of the administration's is bring together republicans and democrats alike...unfortunately they are brought together in their opposition to the bill and even then not because of any common issue, but rather opposing issues with the bill.
If the actual legislative language is somehow agreeable to some folks I still have a hard time believing that anyone can honestly be satisified with the process that brought it about in the first place. Lacking the C-SPAN coverage promised of the negotiations during the campaign as an example of how open the process would be is one (unsurprising) thing, but to literally have kept the bill from all but the most inner circle of the inner circle of democratic leadership is, without a doubt, one of the most disturbing aspect of this bill's crafting. But add to that the bribery required to get senators to blindly vote for the bill before knowing fully what they are voting for is really quite astounding.
Should the bill find final passage, it will be interesting to see what kinds of failures of foresight and generally idiotic provisions begin to come to light as a result of this bastardized legislative process.
I can see how some on the left are OK with numerous shortcomings in the legislative language of this bill. I can even see how those folks might be able to rationalize the blatant disregard for overwhelming opposition to the bill. But I really don't understand how anyone justifies the out and out corruption and bribery used to secure the bill's passage.
As much as this bill is a turd sandwhich, both in terms of it's awful ideas and its incomrehensible inability to grasp the reality of our national debt and budget deficit. I do have to wonder if the fallout in future legislation will be a bigger issue, with the precedent set now that it is OK to bribe, that you can force citizens to purchase goods and services, and least of all lets not forget that a new precedent is now set that any controversial bill can be fortified to require a supermajority to amend or annul. With all of those things, I have, and I never thought I would or could say this, even less faith in the ability of our congress to (intentionally) pass positive legislation.
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