I Pledge Allegiance to my Party

I find irony in the fact that the Senate opens with the pledge of allegiance. I’d like to recommend a few changes to the pledge in order to make it more accurately reflect their beliefs:

I pledge allegiance to my party and to the principles for which it stands, one Party under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for those who agree with my party.

So, like I have repeatedly said, this whole two party thing isn’t working for me. Both sides keep pointing the finger at each other and using the same arguments. If I believe the Democrats, then the Republicans are holding the country hostage and being unreasonable. If I believe the Republicans, then the Democrats are holding the country hostage and being unreasonable. I’ve tried to keep tabs on what has been going on and I think both sides are holding the country hostage and being unreasonable. For weeks, the Republicans refused to compromise and then when it was apparent that a shutdown was inevitable, they suddenly had nothing but compromises and wanted to sit down at the table and talk about it. The Democrats have been warning America for weeks that the Republicans were refusing to negotiate, and then, at the 11^th hour when the Republicans finally gave in and said okay, let’s conference about it, the Democrats said, “You didn’t want to conference last week so we don’t want to conference now.” What the hell? If I have been begging someone for weeks and as the Democrats claimed, months, to do something, I’m not going to turn it down just to prove a point. I don’t know which is worse: the fact that the Republicans attached the Affordable Care Act to government spending or the fact that the Democrats refused an 11^th hour attempt to stop this train wreck. 

We as a people keep complaining about Congress and yet we keep voting for them. Compromise shouldn’t be a dirty word and it also shouldn’t be the result of blackmail, extortion or threats. When your job is to run the country, you need to give everything you have to that job. If you’re a Republican, you don’t get to decide as a party to not support the President and publicly express your wish to see him fail then bitch about it when he stops trying to work with you. You don’t get to say that the presidential election is a referendum on Obamacare, then take that back after the people have spoken. If you’re a Democrat, you don’t get to always be the victim of those “extreme” Republicans. You don’t get to be just as extreme, corrupt and hypocritical as your counterparts on the other side of the aisle and then be excluded from blame. You don’t get to dig in and say that you are right then condemn the other side for digging in because they think that they are right. If you’re Obama, you don’t get to come out and publicly chastise members of a particular party and expect not to suffer repercussions and reinvigorate the hatred that they feel towards you. I think his comments about Republicans should be done behind closed doors. In public, he should plead for bipartisanship and constantly remind people that his door is open to suggestions from both parties.  

At what point will the members of Congress realize that while their party and lobbyists may put money in their pockets, they technically represent neither? The members of Congress are supposed to represent their constituents. This whole party line crap is destroying our country because few people on either side of the aisle have the courage to stand up to their party and let them know that they are wrong. Boehner said we wouldn’t see a government shutdown but when his party said let’s do it, he said, yeah, screw the country and those darn federal workers, if we can’t get what we want, we’re going to shut the government down. Then there’s Harry Reid. I watched him speak last night and declare that the Senate was not going to agree to a last minute conference because the House had repeatedly refused the Senate’s requests for conferences before. He used an analogy about the Senate not being pressured with a gun to their head and I cringed. My interpretation of his words was, “Look here, you didn’t want to talk when we wanted to talk so we’re not talking to you now. You’re wrong. We’re right. This whole country can suck it and um, don’t bother me again until 9:30 tomorrow morning. Goodnight.”

From a personal standpoint, I allowed my health insurance policy to expire September 1 because I plan on checking out the policies available through the exchange and comparing them to my other options. I’m not going to rush and try to sign up today, because I don’t expect the system to work perfectly today. You can’t unveil something on a national level and not expect hiccups. I plan to wait a few days and maybe even a week or two then make my decision. I don’t know if the Affordable Care Act will help me, but I’ve already checked the numbers and it’s cheaper than the plan I had that expired September 1, so I’m already smiling about my decision to wait. I admit that I support the Affordable Care Act. I know there are going to be growing pains as the program is implemented and it is my hope that Congress will be able to address those growing pains and fix them as needed. 

I like the Republican offer to not have people pay a fee if they mess up during the first year. That makes sense to me. From an economic standpoint, I like the Democrats’ position that we can lower the cost of healthcare by having more people pay in to the system. Based on the initial numbers I’m seeing, my cost will be lower. I like the Republican offer to have the members of Congress excluded from qualifying for subsidies, but I don’t like that they want to expand that to include other federal workers who may not have the access to the monetary resources available to the members of Congress. 

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: we need more than two major parties. Many of the current Democrats and Republicans in Congress care more about making each other look bad than they do about working together and moving the country forward. I’m tired of both of them and I’m sure other people feel the same way. We have to do something to change our system before it truly becomes the undoing of our country. I don’t care who did what or who started this, I care about ending this. How do we get back to working together if both sides are playing for keeps?