Lee Doren , a conservative blogger, gave a helpful tip for the Democrats amidst their defeat in holding Ted Kennedy's seat. Take a look see!
In addition to the Doren's comments I have to expound on his point that the federal government really was not designed to send out 2,000 page bills into federal law in less than a year. This system of the approval of both the House and Senate signifies that governance in the U.S. was intended to be conducted more on the state level. The fact that the current health care effort has not been passed yet by a Democratic congress shows that legislation on the federal level is slow and rightfully designed so.
Alexis De Toqueville states in his book Democracy in America, "The Federal government is far removed from its subjects, while the state governments are within the reach of them all and are ready to attend to the smallest appeal" (385). And this is even true today with the different rules and regulations that each states holds in their respective bodies of law all of which have been shaped by the citizens and situations of each state.
One of my biggest qualms with the health care legislation was the implied, one size fits all approach that federal law has upon the states. Such can be seen by examining tax codes. On the state level, the lawmaking body only has to adapt their legislation to the state's tax code and the tax codes of local governments. However passage of a health care bill on the federal level adds another degree of separation from the governed where one decision affects everyone regardless of the situation they are in.
Would the plan care if Texans can pay for it but New Yorkers can't because of a difference in tax codes?
If a law is passed in Congress, it needs to be thought out, debated upon and down right comprehensive...(as in my senator can read it). It won't just affect the nation, it will also affect the states.
I'll go even further on this. The states were supposed to be the primary avenue of decision making, hence why the Constitution is a federal system and not a unitary one (I wrote this in an earlier piece of mine).
ReplyDeleteThe 17th amendment (a big plank in the "Revolution of 1913") vastly undermined this system and essentially took the state's representation in Washington away. No surprise that the power of the federal government grew dramatically afterwards.
Jake, this is Jordan, I think you should give my blog a shoutout. Hahah.