Guest Author
The national Democrat Party stands at a defining crossroads. In the wake of an epic fail over health care on the part of Republicans in Congress and the dilettantes in the White House, Democrats have a choice to make: either become a reprehensible copycat “Party of No” or embark on a nobler path for the common good.
Democrats can hardly be blamed for reveling, at least briefly, in the misfortune of their political foes’ most recent humiliation. After all, the national Republican Party has devoted itself to being as recalcitrant and bellicose as possible over the last eight years. They have brazenly fanned the flames of partisanship by, among other things, repeatedly challenging the very legitimacy of the previous president, defiantly refusing even to hold public hearings on his last Supreme Court nominee and many other judges and high-level federal appointees, as well as relentlessly pursuing a campaign of undermining the federal government’s ability to function effectively. And they have carried out these flagrant assaults on public institutions with apparent impunity, thus far at least.
Still, this is not the time for Democrats to score political points. In addition, simply emulating the obstructive tactics of the Republican Party would be shortsighted at best. As tempting as this strategy might be, even an unlikely electoral rout of Republicans in 2018 would be a pyrrhic victory. It would only precipitate a vicious cycle of retaliation and one-upmanship into the future as legislative control inevitably switches back and forth between increasingly hostile political parties, both unwilling to compromise because of arrogant self-righteousness and mutual disdain. Such puerile behavior is a surefire roadmap for national decline and eventual disintegration.
Instead, Democrats need to do the responsible thing and be the adults in the room. Effective leadership in addressing major problems facing our nation entails laying out practical solutions that enjoy broad-based popular support. This should start with proposed modifications to the Affordable Care Act, which virtually everyone recognizes as in need of significant improvement for the good of the public.
It should not have come as a surprise that Republicans failed to muster enough votes from their own party to pass their “repeal and replace” health care bill in the House. After all, the chasm between today’s conservative Republican orthodoxy and popular opinion on this and so many other issues is wide and growing. As evidence, consider that the Republican nominee has won the popular vote nationwide in only 1 of the 7 (14 percent) presidential elections of the last quarter century. And that one time was the re-election of an incumbent, George W. Bush, whose conservative bona fides were constantly castigated by his party’s right wing because of his centrist positions on many non-military issues, the most notable being his role in the enactment of drug coverage under Medicare.
If the Democrats had provided a detailed proposal for improving the health care law during the 2016 presidential campaign instead of focusing almost exclusively on why the other side was so bad, the result might have been different. But the Clinton campaign decided to err on the side of caution and play defense, almost always a questionable strategy, but especially so given the electorate’s clearly demonstrated craving for courageous action, not feel-good platitudes or tired right-wing nostrums.
Given the current political atmosphere, I suspect the lion’s share of Republicans in Congress would summarily reject any health care fix proffered by the Democrats, however centrist or popular it might be. But that is beside the point. The public deserves to know how the Democrats intend to improve the current health care system, and more importantly, it is the right thing to do. A widely popular, pragmatic plan to make our health care system better would stand in stark contrast to the Republican “repeal and replace” bill, which failed miserably due to gaping divisions within their own party.
Then, when the “repeal and replace” bill tanked, President Donald Trump promptly threatened to let the health care system “explode,” and perhaps even to hasten its collapse, before riding to the rescue with a “beautiful, more affordable” replacement that will provide better coverage for all. Such malarkey. That’s not leadership. That’s recklessness and spite run amok.
I’m hopeful the majority of voters would see the sharp difference between the two parties’ contrasting approaches and reward the adults in the room, not only in 2018, but for the foreseeable future as well.
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Until retiring in 2011, Michael Richardson was assistant secretary of the Florida Department of Community Affairs under Gov. Charlie Crist. He has also served as a committee staff member in the Florida Senate, a policy adviser to Govs. Bob Graham and Bob Martinez, and from 1990 through 2006, a self-employed management consultant to state and local governments.
