#GOPShutdown
“We may do this for a day. We may do this for a week. We may do this for a month. It’s going to end up the same way: It ends by us not repealing Obamacare.” – Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona)
Despite your political ideology, voting Republican should no longer be excusable because a government that is running precedes any ideological perspective. For the first time in 17 years, the government has shut down because it was taken hostage by a party that lost the congressional popular vote by 1.5 Million votes, but whom maintained a majority due to the widespread, congressioanl gerrymandering of 2010. Now, Tea Party Republicans have hijacked congress and have successfully shut down the government because of their opposition to a law that has been in effect for three years, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
The last shutdown, which took place in late 1995, lasted for 22 days and was the result of then-house Majority leader Newt Gingrich’s insistence that the Contract to America was rammed through the senate. When the senate voted, “No,” Mr. Gingrich threatened to not raise the debt ceiling resulting in a government shutdown. The PEW Research center points out that on November 19, 1995, the American people were asked, “Now that the government shutdown has begun, who is mainly responsible for standing in the way of agreement?” 49% of those polled indicated Republicans in Congress were to blame, while only 34% of respondents believed President Clinton was to blame. It is evident that the Republicans are up to the same shenanigans as they were in 1995.
A recent CNN poll shows parallels between today’s shutdown and the shutdown of 1995. The poll discovered that 69% of the American people believe that Republicans are acting like, “spoiled children,” while 46% of Americans blame Republicans for the shutdown. President Obama is blamed by 36%, which was statistically insignificant to the perception of Clinton during that shutdown.
However, the cause for the shutdown this time around might be argued as being more ludicrous than last shutdown. The Republicans have opposed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act ever since Obama tried to pass it, despite it not only being written by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank that closely aligns with the Tea Party, but even despite the fact that it was championed and passed by the former Governor of Massachusetts, and former Presidential candidate, Willard Mitt Romney. In fact, the fiscal conservatives hate it so much they spent over $50 Million of taxpayer money voting to repeal is over 40 times. More recently, more money was wasted as, “fiscally conservative” Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) spoke on the house floor for 21 hours not to filibuster any bill, but to, “stand strong against the Affordable Care Act.”
The GOP’s hatred for this bill has made them take every step necessary to try to defeat this bill. The first course of action was to claim it was unconstitutional, and former Florida Attorney General Bill Nelson and his successor, Attorney General Pamela Jo Bondi, tried to challenge it all the way up to the Supreme Court of the United States. When Bush’s nominee to the Supreme Court, Chief Justice John Roberts, was the swing vote in favor of the Affordable Care Act and wrote the majority opinion stating it was constitutional, the Romney campaign and the GOP started a new talking point against the Affordable Care Act: “The only way to replace Obamacare is to replace Obama,” they said. This was their tagline going into the debates and into the polls, yet they lost to President Obama with the Affordable Care Act as a main issue during the election.
A factor that makes GOP opposition towards the Affordable Care Act surprising is that many constituents of these congressmen don’t know what the Affordable Care Act is. With the mainstream nickname being, “Obamacare,” a nickname later accepted by President Obama because, according to the President, “I do care,” the Tea Party and conservative talk radio relies on negativity towards Obama and false accusations towards the Affordable Care Act in order to retain power.
The accusations of the Affordable Care Act range from death panels, a false rumor picked up by Tea Party favorite Sarah Palin, to the ideology that it will lead to guns being taken away. We the people have to ask ourselves, “If the Affordable Care Act is really that bad, why are lies being made to defeat it?” Surely, a reasonable person can conclude that if a law really were this bad, then it could be defeated with the truth, not with lies. Yet, the Tea Party has successfully created strong opposition to the Affordable Care Act, and three years after the law was passed, after court battles and elections meant to defeat the Affordable Care Act, the Tea Party dominated Republican Party has successfully held the government hostage and shut it down.
What is the result of the Republican shutdown? 800,000 employees are not getting paid. Many educational services, such as NASA’s picture of the day, are no longer in operation. Every national park is closed. The new World War II memorial, which has re-opened due to a loophole, was closed during the first day of the shut down much to the despise of many World War II veterans, many of whom had hotel reservations, that were not allowed to access their own memorial.
A more serious implication of the shutdown is that the National Institute of Health is not able to start new clinical trials. Many new patients are being denied access to NIH clinics, even those with cancer. In fact, 75% of NIH employees are being furloughed. The Center For Disease Control has stated that they are impaired when it comes to monitoring the new strains of flu. The CDC is also having trouble with their infectious disease surveillance programs, which monitors diseases such as HIV and TB. The U.S. Commodity Future Trading Commission has stated that it will not work during the shutdown. The Department of Transportation will halt drug testing of its employees. E-Verify, the service that allows employees to know they are hiring legal workers, will go offline. The economic implications of the shutdown are even more staggering, as many contractors have to also halt their operations and private small businesses that operate on government land have been forced to shut down.
Isn't it wonderful knowing that Republicans are willing to sacrifice this, and more, solely because they do not like the Affordable Care Act? Despite the shutdown, the roll out for the Affordable Care Act still went through. Yet, the Republican response is that none of this matters, because, as Republican Congressman Steve King states, it’s all warranted, “Because we’re right, simply because we’re right.”
-Luis Rolfo (Communications Co-Chair)
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