South Dakota’s governor and the state attorney general have committed South Dakota to a lawsuit that disputes the Constitutionality of the recently passed healthcare reform bill. They believe that the federal government has infringed on state’s rights with a mandate requiring individuals to purchase health insurance. Further, they imply that the federal government should not force individuals to participate in this plan without their consent. Yet the governmental mandate requiring the purchase of health insurance was previously promoted several times by Republican Party elected officials and election candidates.
I do not care to participate in this lawsuit, but apparently the Governor and the state attorney general aren’t actually concerned with this contradiction of governmental perception on personal rights infringements. It isn’t the first time they have acted in this manner. South Dakota’s majority party’s agenda has been pursued through state government with regard to the abortion issue also. Most likely, this is not a situation unique to South Dakota or to just one ruling political party.
An article from the Dakota Today blog site identified Senator Thune’s one sided view of political partisanship. Many people seem to be unable to conceive the possibility that there is than one way to view political issues and that complete agreement is not possible. Compromise appears to be the only way to achieve some level of fairness on many issues, but this concept appears lost on the ears of members of the Republican Party.
Apparently, according to Senator Thune, partisanship is something that Democrats engage in. Republicans participate in strong political opposition. When the Democrats were the minority party in Congress, they were described as partisan obstructionists when they strongly opposed Republican sponsored legislation. Interestingly, it is extremely rare that the Democrats ever act with complete unity in opposition to legislation. The Republicans appear to be able to pull that theoretically amazing unified opposition quite easily. How is it that a political party can be structure such that all of its millions of members are in complete agreement? Is it possible that all those millions are not incomplete agreement with their elected representatives?
Children often form informal groups that appear to share ideas that aren’t necessarily based on facts. Long ago, most of our ancestors were ignorant of the actual shape of the earth and the workings of the Universe. Cosmological ignorance took a long time to overcome and before it was, the incorrect concept of a flat earth was the common and unquestioned view of the majority of mankind. Isn’t it possible that simple ignorance, as well as intentional self-imposed ignorance help to unify the Republican members of Congress?
If it isn’t ignorance that results in what I view as an incorrect or an improbable degree of party unity, then what is it? Is it possible that health care reform is not actually the issue that is being resisted? Is it possible that one party political control is really the reason for the completely unified front presented by the Republican Congressional Minority?
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