2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: Does Sanders' college plan really rely on governors to release funds? [View all]HassleCat
(6,409 posts)As we know all to well, ACA depends on the cooperation of governors, and some have flat-out refused to allow anything to happen. In the old days, we could bully the states into cooperating by threatening to hold back on funds they needed. Since the Reagan era, we pulled so much federal funding for so many things that the states can just tell us to take a hike. So it appears governors like Walker could, and probably would, refuse to release federal money. That's the problem with trying to get any federal program passed now. To get red state and purple state Democrats, some of whom should probably be called "Democrats," with the quotation marks, to vote for a bill, we have to promise the states some say in disbursing the money. And we have governors like Walker who will intentionally harm their own citizens for ideological reasons. This is bad sign for any new or upgraded federal program, not just for Sanders' college proposal. We are living in a country that is quickly becoming not so much a nation as a collection of 50 fiefdoms, each ruled by its own special lord and his or her vassals.