The politics of governance

Here’s a news flash: Politics and governing don’t mix.

They are, in fact, two very different human activities. Politics is a sport; governing is a science.

I thought about that again while listening to 6th District Congressman Bob Goodlatte talking about health care in the Holy Cross Regional School gymnasium Saturday afternoon.

The usually affable Goodlatte lost his smile about halfway through the event as he was bombarded with questions, proclamations and mini-speeches from the audience.

“I’m not a good public speaker, “ one man said, pulling out several typed pages from his briefcase and beginning to read.

“You can’t read all that out loud,” Goodlatte said. “Other people are waiting for their turn. Just get to the point.”

That was the problem, at least to me — nobody seemed to get to the point. I walked out more confused about President Obama’s health care bill and whether it was good or bad than I had been before.

For the most part, the crowd was in sync with Goodlatte, although some people seemed to applaud everything anyone said. Good points were made, but they were all in isolation. No one connected the dots.

“I don’t believe some people,” muttered Jim Barron, a participant in last year’s News & Advance “President of Us” contest who has come up with his own health care plan. “I had somebody tell me the other day: ‘I’m not going to let the government get its hands on my Medicare.’ Doesn’t he know Medicare is a government program?”

Goodlatte is a smart man, and I agreed with some of what he said. To his credit, he also set a woman straight who brought up the urban myth of “death committees” who would recommend assisted suicide to people deemed no longer useful.

“I don’t support this bill,” the Congressman said, “but there’s nothing like that in there.”

Again, think of politics as a sport. In sports, your team can do nothing wrong. If the other team wins, it was a mistake. Every call the officials make that goes against your team is flawed. If one of your players is overly aggressive, he’s an “old school throwback.” Aggressiveness on the part of the opposition makes them “thugs.”

Thus, Goodlatte was telling us, there would already be a flawless health care bill in place if it were not for those pesky Democrats.

“We’ve got plenty of ideas,” he said, “but the President won’t meet with us.”

When “your” president is in place, I’ve noticed, the federal government is “we.” When the other party is in power, it becomes “them.”

Goodlatte mentioned the word “bi-partisan” about 20 times, but somehow it didn’t seem sincere.

“This is a representative democracy,” he said at one point. “Even President Obama knows that.”

I did agree with Goodlatte that there’s really no rush here. Far better to craft a law most of the principals can live with than to further widen the gulf between the two sides of the Congressional aisles.

All through the 2008 presidential election campaign, people kept complaining about health care, and how the system was “broke” and had to be fixed yesterday. So the new president tries to do something about it and is treated as if he were the anti-Christ.

What’s wrong with: “We appreciate your efforts, but we don’t agree with your plan. We need something different”?

There’s plenty of time for politics. It happens in November.