I’ve always been more of a process guy than a results guy. You can always control your process; you can’t always control your results. Thus, outside of all the policy reasons that may or may not happen as a result of the passage of the AHCA (may never pass in the Senate; some provisions, if passed, may never be utilized by the states), yesterday bothers me as a citizen.
The House of Representatives, via 217 Republican members, passed a bill that impacts health care - something vitally important for so many people, and a sector of more than 15% of our economy.
They passed this bill without having a hearing on it. For comparison, the ACA, which the AHCA seeks to repeal and replace, had over 70 hearings. Hearings give an opportunity to debate items in a proposed bill; it should, if nothing else, impress upon members of the House the seriousness of legislation.
They passed the bill without having any reports from the Congressional Budget Office, which attempts to analyze the impact the bill, if passed, would have on such things as number of individuals covered by Medicaid, the tax and revenue implications for federal and state governments, the expense consequences for federal and state governments, and so on. While a CBO score is not definitive, practically any bill that impacts the economy as significantly as this one usually has a CBO analysis with it. If for no other reason, having such an analysis shows the seriousness of what’s being considered, and that the people legislating it understands the seriousness of it.
None of that happened. Some members of the House even admitted to not having read the bill before passage (and honestly, many probably couldn’t considering it was even circulated in final form until the day of the vote!).
Honestly, I am appalled and bothered by it more than many other political events over the last decade. And yet, House Republicans acted in a manner that belittles everything about the legislative process. Not to be outdone, House Democrats sang “nah nah nah nah, hey hey hey, good bye.” This is presumably in response to their belief that they can retake the majority in the House of Representatives because of this vote in the 2018 mid-term elections.
Thinking about this morning, what strikes me is the lack of seriousness, and the attitude, for lack of better phrasing, that all of this is a game. The House GOP doesn’t care what they pass, as long as it gives the political victory among their base of repealing the ACA. The House Dems, even if they didn’t mean to, by singing look juvenile and come off as being politically opportunistic.
House GOP wont’ be able to control the impact of the legislation, both on people’s lives, on our economy, and on their own political prospects. Similarly, the House Dems couldn’t control the outcome of passage of the bill (being in the minority), and all of its fallout. Both parties could control how they acted and approached the legislative process. I would never be (and couldn’t be) as careless in my process in my job as the House GOP was in passing this bill. I would never be (and shouldn’t be) as immature as the House Dems were in their immediate response.
I continue to hope that at some point our political process will give some ground back to the legislating and governing process; that our representatives will approach governing with the seriousness with which we approach our jobs and professions. If yesterday is any indication, I wonder how long I can continue to maintain that hope.
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