Party-Line Voting

I understand that in America, we have devolved into primarily a two-party political system. To be a successful politician, you are most likely either a Republican, or a Democrat.

Lately, it seems that our Congress has been completely unable to do what we sent them there to do. In order to run a country under a two-party system, with the rules we have put into place, our lawmakers must be willing to compromise.

Since, in most cases, it requires 60% of the Senators to vote for a bill before it can pass, that means that someone has to vote in a way that may not be in line with their particular party.

The Washington Post has a neat website that lets you look at how our Senators and Congressmen voted. I find it particularly amazing that in the 112th Congress, only 3 Democrats have voted with the rest of their party less than 90% of the time, while 29 Republican Senators have less than 90% compliance with their party votes.

Does this mean that the Democrats have a bigger responsibility for the gridlock in the Senate than do the Republicans?

In the House, 33 (13.5%)  Republicans have voted with their party less than 90% of the time, 38 Democrats (19.3%) have crossed party lines to vote with the Republicans. A bit more even, although I find it very startling to discover than John Boehner and Christopher Lee have never once crossed the party line to vote.

How is the House Majority leader supposed to lead by example if, from his voting record, he is completely opposed to any compromise at all?

Explain to me the vote that occurred in the Colorado State Senate yesterday on Civil Partnerships. It passed, but on a strict party-line vote. Not a single Republican voted for the bill, and it passed only because there are more Democrats than Republicans. It is unlikely to make it through the Colorado House as it is controlled by the Republicans, who will vote as a block, despite any personal stance they might have.

We didn’t vote for our Senators and Congressmen so that they would vote based on some strict party guidance. We voted for them because as individuals on the campaign trail, they convinced us that they were reasonable people, who generally thought like us, and that we could trust them to cast votes that were wise and would improve our society.

You can’t tell me that there was not a single Republican in the Colorado Senate who didn’t think that Civil Partnerships were a good idea. If you look at the opinion polls, the majority of Americans are now in favor of gay marriage, so why isn’t this being reflected by our legislators. OK, so gay marriage may be a hot topic, but this split down party lines happens on a lot of bills that aren’t so controversial.

Being stubborn to the point where nobody wins means we have failed. Obviously there is a minority of Senators and Congressmen who will vote their conscience, at least some of the time, but not enough of them, and not often enough to actually move us forward.

Had we a working government, how much shorter would our recession have been? Had we a working government, would we have let our past few Presidents drag us into conflicts overseas where we had no business being? Had we a working government, would we need to step over the homeless people on the streets of our cities? Had we a working government, would our high school students be graduating reading at an average 5th grade level, unable to balance a checkbook?

It will take a lot more than “Occupy! Wall Street” or “Occupy! Denver” to get things back on track. Our young people need to wake up and care. As in the 1960’s and 70’s, they need to get mad enough to do something about it before any change can occur.