An aggressive, unpopular government

(written by lawrence krubner, however indented passages are often quotes). You can contact lawrence at: lawrence@krubner.com, or follow me on Twitter.

For the sake of stability and the rule of law, I see a need for governments to survive, despite being unpopular. But in those cases, the individual politicians need to be protected from voter anger, since the only benefit of allowing governance by the unpopular is so they can push through their laws their own constituents would hate.

To me, it seems like the worst of all possible forms of government to have rule-by-unpopular-minority combined with every-politician-is-vulnerable-and-afraid.

Which is what we have in the USA. The Republicans lost the popular vote in both the Senate and the for the President. Yet they are aggressively pushing their agenda. Because they think it might play well with their own narrow base.

Despite a national demand for Planned Parenthood (in the U.S., 2.5 million women and men go to a Planned Parenthood affiliate for yearly checkups) and President Barack Obama’s measures to protect the organization, Republicans still plan to gut funding under the new Trump administration.

“Planned Parenthood legislation would be in our reconciliation bill,” Ryan stated during a press conference on Thursday, referring to the congressional procedure that allows legislation to pass with only simple majority rather than a supermajority, bypassing any attempts at a filibuster.

With Republicans having a 52-48 Senate majority, Democrats are preparing for an uphill battle when it comes to blocking the reconciliation bill.

“We are going to stand against this with every fiber of our beings,” said Rep. Diana DeGette, chairwoman of the House Pro-Choice Caucus, to the Washington Post.

Sadly, with the vast majority of Republicans wanting to harm women (and men!) by restricting their access to reproductive healthcare, DeGette and her allies’ efforts probably won’t be enough.

Post external references

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    http://theslot.jezebel.com/shit-weasel-paul-ryan-announces-plan-to-defund-planned-1790812989
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