Zachary Rzasa
Guest Columnist
A major election is coming up in November. Every seat in the House of Representatives is up for election, along with one-third of the Senate seats. Based on dozens of credible projections, I have been able to get an idea of what the 114th Congress may look like.
As many of us know, the current Congress has the lowest approval rating in history, 13 percent at the start of 2014, and the American people are fed up with its performance. It is finally time for everyone to express the feelings they have toward their elected officials.
Republicans have received a majority of the blame for what has happened in the past few years and it seems that they would lose a lot of seats to the Democrats in both the House and Senate. However, this is not the case.
With the Affordable Care Act’s rollout failures and its inevitable overall failure, people are finally realizing that, although Republicans may have tried too hard to repeal the law, the GOP was right to be so concerned about the president’s signature bill. They were jealous that they had no say in the new law. Perhaps if Democrat framers were less exclusive, then conservative ideas could have been implemented in the correct areas and the ACA may have been more successful.
Personally, I have seen numerous small businesses and families having to pay large amounts more than what was promised by the president and Democrats. It turns out the people who already could afford insurance are being forced to cover those who cannot afford it.
Of course, we can all agree Americans need to be covered. That is why the bill was so popular in the first place. What was not brought to light, however, was the thousands of pages of other stuff that Americans would not be too happy about. The politics that went into creating this bill and the thousands of pages of bureaucracy and regulations is what I, along with millions of others in America, have a problem with.
The president and those who side with him have accused Fox News and conservative pundits for any bad ideas the public has toward the ACA. Blaming any type of criticism you receive on a single media outlet is an example of how disconnected the administration is from the American people. It seems like as long as those who could not afford healthcare before can finally afford it, it does not matter who else the law hurts.
But as White House press secretary Jay Carney claimed, the Congressional Budget Office’s projections regarding Obamacare’s effect on Americans was a good thing. The “equivalent” of 2.2 million jobs lost is a good thing. Finally, those millions who were forced to work just to provide healthcare to their families will no longer have to work. That is a good thing, right?
Even Democrats are backing away from the healthcare law that was once their holy grail. They are finally realizing that by backing up the president’s plan, they put their own seats in jeopardy for the upcoming election. Some have attempted jumping ship in hopes of saving their future position within the House or Senate, but it may be too late for most Democrats who stood by the passing of Obamacare and now seek reelection.
The Republicans have a majority in the House (232-200), and that majority should remain at least through the next two years. It is the Senate, however, that politically savvy people have been paying close attention to.
Credible campaign analysts, such as those at Politico and Larry Sabato at University of Virginia, have projected the Democrats will lose six seats in the Senate, where they have just 53. If these projections are correct, the Republicans will gain a majority in the Senate and control Congress.
The vulnerable seats for Democrats include those in North Carolina, Arkansas, South Dakota, Montana, West Virginia and Louisiana. Other seats, such as Mark Warner’s here in Virginia, may also be taken by Republicans. Personally, I believe Ed Gillespie, who is running against Warner, would be an excellent senator.
Now, before you get all up in arms about my previous statements, let me tell you why this is a good thing.
First of all, many people who do not pay much attention to politics see Republicans as terrible and unwilling to work with any Democrat on anything. This is not the case. Although they lean to the right of the political spectrum, they haven’t been given much to work with.
President Obama knows the Democrats in the House are outnumbered and that anything he does not want passed in the Senate will not be. If he knows that both houses of Congress will pass a bill and put it on his desk for a signature, then he is more likely to sign that bill, thus enacting it into law. The blame cannot be spread out anymore and a bill’s failure will be solely on the president.
I can refer to the early ’90s when both houses of Congress were controlled by Republicans and Bill Clinton — a Democrat — was in the White House. We saw compromise and we saw prosperity. It seems as if this combination is what we need to keep an even balance in the realm of U.S. politics. This is also good because we can already tell how difficult it will be for Republicans to put forward any type of opposition against Hillary Clinton in 2016.
If Republicans go into that presidency willing to work with the new president, things will change dramatically. I think things were started on the wrong foot between Obama and Republicans — and I really do not think it has nearly as much to do with race as many believe. This unwillingness to work with one another has led to the partisan gridlock we see today in Washington. Trust me, this will not take place forever.
We have witnessed some slight changes in the past few weeks that can give us hope about the people we send to Washington. I think partisanship is at an all-time high and is on the decline. For all of you who are skeptical about the future of our government, you can rest assured that we are on a path to recovery in Washington.
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