More and more the opponents of Medicaid expansion/Healthy Utah balk at the suggestion of addressing the issue at a special legislative session before the general session in January. It's likely that this is, for some, a delaying tactic to protect their conservative credentials in the upcoming election. For others it's an indicator that they simply won' t let this move forward at any point. The question for us as voters is whether we choose to do something about it. If the decision doesn't come until January, then we need to do exercise our electoral control over the situation. As Episcopal Bishop Scott Hayashi said at the Entitled to Life premiere, "If their values won't allow them to do this, we need to get people with better values". The problem is that the necessary step to do this is an unlikely and unpopular one in Utah: electing more Democrats to our legislature.
While I'm sure it won't seem this way to some readers of this blog, I've tried to avoid getting too overtly partisan. I'm far more concerned with getting people the help that they need than with putting a win in my party's column. Being aggressively partisan is a great way to lose half of your audience, and besides, not only have I encountered some support from conservative friends, a few of the real champions of this issue are Republicans. But sadly, far too few. And there is no denying that all of the opposition we're facing is coming from the right side of the aisle. And we're giving them the power to kill a program that 77,000 Utahns desperately need by removing the systems of checks and balances and making this a one party state. And it's a party that doesn't represent the vast majority of Utahns who support the Governor's plan (but who choose full expansion over the status quo). The facts are as clear as they can get that we need to do this. And the majority of Utah's Democratic Party has done all it can for compromise by getting behind the Governor's plan rather than holding out for full ACA expansion. Those who haven't will end up supporting it over doing nothing (most are almost there anyway).
So what'skeeping you from voting for Democratic candidates? A belief in "Fiscal responsibility"? The party/ideology that's advocating throwing away millions in funding to do the financially sound thing while they pour more of your tax dollars into "studying" a crystal clear issue has no right to call themselves fiscally responsible. Is it "standing against government tyranny"? Could there possibly be a more clear-cut case of government tyranny than a legislature which denies tens of thousands of human beings the right to stay alive because they want to make an ideological point? Is it "moral values" ? It's positively obscene to call turning a blind eye to the suffering of thousands of people "moral". Wherever one stands on issues such as same sex marriage, they are not the beginning and end of morality. The sanctity of human life is a moral issue, and it's absurd to think that applies only to the unborn. Besides, adding more Democrats to our legislature isn't going to change Utah's abortion laws, and the issue of Utah's same-sex marriage ban will be decided by the United States Supreme Court, not the Utah State Legislature. What will be decided by the legislature is the fate of 77,000 Utahns who need health insurance but can't get it. It's very likely this includes people you know. Probably people you love. A vote for Republican legislators (with a few exceptions) is a vote to deny them their chance at health insurance. A vote for a Democratic legislator is a vote to give them a chance. I truly wish it wasn't that simple. I wish more conservative Utah politicians cared more about who lives and who dies than what the Eagle Forum will say if they accept money from Big Bad Barack. But all of my experience with this issue is telling me that far too many of them don't.
If you're committed to "voting for the person, not the party", fine. Take a look a what the individual believes and supports. But please don't make the mistake of basing your vote on who seems like a nice guy or talks the same way you do or goes to your church or walked ten miles in the rain every day as a child to return his grandmother's library books or who gives you a warm fuzzy feeling. In my opinion that sort of personality based voting is even worse than blind party voting. Those things don't tell you what a candidate will do in office, they tell you whether a candidate is likable. In my activist experience I've come across many likable people who are displaying a total disregard for morality, logic and human life. Electing more people like that is the last thing we need to do.
I realize this is going to be a tough pill to swallow even for some who have been completely with me on this issue, but lean conservative or toward the belief that both parties are bad. But in this case, we really do have one side which wants to help 77,000 people get badly needed health care, and one side which wants to deny it in defiance of all morality and common sense. Is partisan loyalty really worth more than human lives? Please consider voting for a Democratic legislator. Even if they aren't elected, each vote (especially from a voter who usually votes for Republicans, Independents or Libertarians) sends a message that one party cannot hold tens of thousands of people hostage to their ideology and get away with it. Can they?
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