OPINION:
Placing people above party, Sen. John Fetterman, Pennsylvania Democrat, embodies a value increasingly rare in his party. Rather than mindlessly following party orthodoxy, no matter how harmful or absurd, he focuses not on inventions promoted by alternate universe colleagues or their mainstream media partners, but on supporting what’s best for the American people.
Driven by Trump derangement syndrome, many Democrats have lost their moral compass by making claims so outrageous as to defy common sense and undermine the common good. Advocating such an alarming set of party-above-people fables, liberals have increasingly closed ranks around positions less suited to reality than unmitigated insanity.
Consider the recent government shutdown. Democrats were quick to blame and slow to reason in claiming Republicans caused the stalemate. This was so even though liberals rejected a stopgap funding resolution 15 times to keep the government open at least through Nov. 21.
As a result, hundreds of thousands of nonessential federal workers were held as hostages on furlough without pay during the 43-day congressional game of chicken, waiting for whoever would blink first — hardly a page from the Fetterman playbook of people first, party second.
Repeatedly labeling such intransigence as “leverage,” the signature Democratic demand was to continue enhanced health care subsidies for Obamacare insurance plans set to expire Dec. 31. The impasse continued even after liberals were assured that health care negotiations would start not from the threat of a prolonged shutdown but only after funding was restored and federal employees returned to work.
It didn’t matter that insurance premium enhancements were initially sunsetted — not by Republicans but by the Biden administration — as temporary COVID-19-related supports. It didn’t matter that allowing increasingly higher-income people to receive taxpayer-subsidized insurance plans drove premium costs to more than double from 2013 to 2019. Nor did it matter that, during the Biden years, prioritizing enrollment over eligibility verification led to massive fraud.
All that really mattered to the Democrats was that, if Republicans didn’t immediately guarantee enhanced subsidies as a permanent part of Obamacare, Democrats would shut down the government, harm federal workers and make the false yet damaging claim that Republicans were indifferent to the struggles of poor Americans.
By playing politics, many Democrats have completely surrendered the high ground in prioritizing what they want (political power) over what they should want most: doing what’s best for the American people.
NEIL BRIGHT
Napanoch, New York
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