No mandate

Didn’t Republicans spend the last seven years telling me that they had a better plan for health care? That it took them longer than five minutes after the November elections to roll out their “better plan” is, by itself, telling. And now what they propose is nothing more than high income earner welfare. Full disclosure: I am fortunate to be among the “high income” earners.

And I don’t care — at least not about Obamacare’s cost or expense, or what increased tax liability that expanded health care might mean to me. Of course there’s a limit to that thought — for example, if you told me that 50% of my income would be taken, I will admittedly object. That said, that Obamacare asked the upper 1%, and the upper 10%, to pay more does not bother me. Frankly, it should be part of the social contract.

I voted Republican from the time I was 18 years old through George W. Bush’s first term. I still believe I am Republican — but in the oldest sense of the word. To paraphrase Ronald Reagan, “I didn’t leave my party, my party left me.” “My” party has spent a decade doing nothing but obstructing instead of what they should have been doing — compromising in a manner reflecting the preferences of their broader electorate. Shameful.

Now that the Republicans are in power — in all three branches — I would expect them to act in a manner consistent with their electorate. What that concept used to mean was that if 49% of a representative’s constituents wanted to pursue a particular path, and 51% of their constituents wanted to pursue a polar opposite path, the politician would necessarily moderate and find a place slightly off the middle. But what that means now: since 51% of the electorate wants “X” and they are the majority, the elected representative must somehow twist the claim of “majority” to a claim of “mandate.”

A “mandate” is something north of 80%. To the Republican Party (my preferred party): You do not have a mandate. You have marginal support that will prove fleeting if you don’t act in a manner that reflects this reality. The “repeal and replace” proposal made by Republicans is neither.