Tuesday, May 01, 2007

President will veto, Democrats will weaken...what was the point?

As I read this article in the Washington Times that states, Democrats conceding on war bill I was left with that feeling of mild frustration and irritation at the time lost during their process of arguing this thru the House and the Senate. Realistically it is hard to imagine the President not vetoing this bill and I understand the political factor of the blame game knowing that his veto will be politicized. Yet at the end of the day, knowing that there was not enough votes to overturn a veto I couldn't help wondering about all of the other issues facing our country right now.

I spend a lot of time reading what Congress is up to and there is no way anyone could state it is an efficient process. The days and sometimes weeks spent arguing something that is going to end up being changed and at times done almost over again creates part of the very problem we have right now. We focus on the large issues, let them overwhelm us then wonder why very little action is ever the end result. Our country is facing many issues right now, which Washington pretends they can fix. The reality is there is very little that Congress can fix and the more power they have in holding things up as well as continuing the public perception that we have to wait until they do something adds to the general feeling of discontent and apathy.

Take health care as just one example, part of the reason for increased insurance costs is the way people are over billed for services and billed for services they never received. Insurance companies make a huge deal about how they take fraud seriously but most of my contacts with various insurance companies over the years related to over billing or fraudulent charges have taken a huge amount of pushing on my part to make anything happen. What can basically only be described as bill padding happens all to often, with the insurance company having negotiated a lower price for services seems to accept this padding as a standard operating procedure. Yet, that adds to the cost of our health care and the double tier standard of fees for those who do not have insurance is an additional factor. I've taken a stand against being charged for services that I or family members have not received. I've personally saved our insurance company over $25,000 in the last two years alone in being aggressive on this issue. It has not made our rates go down but if more of us did this? We might at least have a starting point...That might not take as long as Washington does to actually accomplish something...

3 comments:

Scott G said...

I think it was a good debate to have, but you have to do it in a way that allows for a debate where both sides can win. Knowing that Bush does not negotiate anything because he gets all the correct answers from how his Cheerios look every morning, it was a political move that they never intended to back up.

SensorG said...

I'd like to see the Democrats not back down, but the Republicans own the "we're support our troops" thing, even though they don't. Democrats are afraid of looking weak on defense.

Either way, this will be an issue the Democrats can use to beat the Republicans over the head with in 2008.

Hooda Thunkit (Dave Zawodny) said...

IMO, the political animal, especially the Washington political animal spends most of its waking moments stroking its own ego and fighting for "Face-Time."

Results, to them is getting reelected.

A sad comment on the status quo :-(