Now Make It Matter

The point of this election was not simply to defeat Republicans.

Don’t get me wrong. That was job Number One—in a critical moment in American history, the GOP and the Trumpist political movement had to be stopped.

In my judgment, Donald Trump’s corrupt, cruel, authoritarian presidency, and the Republican Party’s willingness to accede to his every wish, posed a significant threat to our constitutional order. Defeating that threat at the ballot box mattered enormously.

Plus, they were screwing up big time.

But winning an election is only the beginning of responsibility.

People across this country in their tens of millions came out to vote and delivered a thunderous verdict on the ruling president and his party because they want something to change in their lives. They want to afford a home, raise their children, see a doctor. They want some relief, a little breathing room.

So now comes the hard part. And the question I have:

Can the next Congress get it done?

I say “Congress” because fixing this country cannot be done simply through one political party’s dominance or governing tactics. That is another lesson of this election: Country over party.

The votes have been tabulated. (Nearly) all of the races have been called. Now the real work begins.

Both parties must shift from campaigning to governing, and act on the challenges facing our country: the Iran war, healthcare, immigration, affordability, the list goes on. The solutions are complex, and don’t always line up neatly along party lines.

Today’s column is about two of these complex issues. The public has a crucial role to play in getting any solution done.

When a story or an issue isn’t straightforward, it can be reallt helpful to turn to Ground News. You’ve heard me talk about how I enjoy using the site and app a lot (especially their Blindspot feature) which highlights stories outside your echo chamber.

But now they‘ve just rebuilt their app to get you up to speed more quickly, showing what’s dividing the coverage, and surface more reporting you might have missed.

Take this week’s story about JD Vance blaming the Iran conflict for the GOP defeat. I can see, all in one place, different outlets’ coverage and angles, as well as a reliability rating (and even the ownership) of each outlet. There is nothing else I know like this.

For example, Ground News highlights that left-leaning coverage framed Vance as “fleeing a sinking ship,” while right-leaning sources instead focused on how Vance is carving an “America First” path (likely with his own political goals in mind.)

The new features also point me to where I can dive even deeper on the topic with related podcasts, opinion pieces, and links to primary sources quoted in the reporting.

Ground News has been a longtime partner to Real Patriotism, helping me keep the bulk of my content free to my subscribers. If you haven’t already, I encourage you to check it out with my link, groundnews.com/moran, and try a subscription for 40% off.

Whatever comes next in our unpredictable political world, you can count on Ground News to help make sense of it.

Now to my assignment for each political party.

The system is disintegrating from the bottom up.

The Affordable Care Act was a major step toward a health-care system that works for all of us. But it left plenty of work unfinished, especially on costs.

In the years since, rising medical prices and increased use of care have continued to push spending higher. And now, the expiration of enhanced insurance subsidies has made coverage harder to afford for many of the people Obamacare was designed to help.

And the Republicans’ relentless efforts year after year to attack and destroy the program—without ever putting a single, serious bill to fix health care forward—have left millions of Americans in a terrible limbo.

Wondering if the chest pain is serious enough to get it checked out. Hoping the child’s cough is just the flu. Realizing as the end of the month comes that the money’s not there to cover next month’s premium.

Fixing the entire system will take a sustained effort, and almost certainly a new president. But the rescue can begin right away and get relief for people who need it most.

The Democrats can get this done with their huge majorities. And they will find more than a few chastened Republican survivors who will be newly liberated from their terror of Trump and keen on focusing on their constituents. Like they should have been doing for years.

So: Start by restoring the enhanced subsidies that helped Americans buy coverage through the Affordable Care Act. Those expired at the end of last year. Now families shopping for next year’s insurance face another round of rising premiums.

Think about who buys this coverage. The contractor. The farmer. The woman who left a job to start a business. The couple trying to bridge the years between a layoff and Medicare. These are people doing the right thing: working hard, taking risks, making their own way. Too many wonder whether they can afford to get sick.

Democrats should begin negotiations now and make an affordable, durable agreement an early priority of the new Congress.

Invite Republicans in. Negotiate! Figure out the financing, the details.

Get people some relief.

So much for the Democrats. What should Republicans do right away in the next Congress?

Our Constitution specifically assigns to Congress the power to tariff.

Alas, over the years, Congress surrendered some of that power to the presidency—and Trump grabbed every shred of it his lawyers could find and went crazy.

Americans hate Trump’s tariff frenzy. Republicans should join with Democrats and get back to sanity.

GOP leaders should decide which tariffs serve the country and which impose needless costs on American families and businesses. Republicans could help reclaim that responsibility, pare down the tariff regime, and kill what’s left.

Most important, Democratic and Republican members of Congress should start acting like actual Representatives and Senators again—and require congressional approval for new presidential tariffs.

There is already a place to start. Republican Senator Chuck Grassley and Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell introduced legislation requiring new tariffs to expire after 60 days unless Congress approves them.

Tariffs can have a legitimate purpose: protecting a vital industry, countering unfair trade. But American importers pay them, and some of that cost reaches the family buying a washing machine, the contractor buying supplies, the small manufacturer buying parts. Each tariff should have to earn its keep.

So Republicans would have to exercise judgment independent of Donald Trump. They should want to show that, given that he is a wheezing, stumbling, sleepy lame duck. More important: That is part of the job they were elected to do.

Neither assignment is easy. The new Congress takes office in January. Trump will still hold the veto pen.

Start anyway. Put proposals on the table. Find the votes. Give the country an argument about how to make life better, and work toward an agreement that actually does.

American voters have entrusted these politicians with something precious: the chance to improve our lives through self-government.

Make that trust worth something.

—Terry