Reply #16: That's also not how it works.

[Political Heretic]

Keeping the issue keeps the momentum. Health care failed because Democrats were no more serious about doing it than Republicans were. It's that simple. You're right that we can't get anything done if our representatives are never serious about doing it.

But, if they are, then what we see over and over again is that incremental policy approaches fail to accomplish their goals for a variety of reasons. Voting against a next to nothing bill when there is momentum to address the political issue means keeping the issue rather than giving it up, and when something is unresolved it builds tension and momentum to resolve it - IF political representatives are sincerely willing to fight for it.

When no one actually wants the isssue, and when everyone wants to pass whatever will "look" like action without actually doing anything substantive, then we're all screwed no matter what we do.