End of the Washington Shutdown: The Scarlett O’Hara Method

Both chambers of the U.S. Congress voted in favor of the deal, ending a two-week government shutdown and raising the debt ceiling until Feb. 7. America — which was easy to predict — escaped the threat of default, but the disputes between the two parties dragged on until the last minute.

So, is everything fine now? No. The agreement has “patched up” only some of the problems that the U.S. is facing today. In spite of pushing a beautiful political initiative “community of democracies” throughout the world, America itself is not a good example for others. Its own political system is characterized by scandalous quarrels, or even by paralyzing state institutions just because of some narrow, partisan interests. Politicians increasingly resort to filibuster. The electoral law leads to enormous discrepancies within the system of representation. For example, the Wyoming state senator represents 282,000 citizens, while the senator from California almost 19 million. The few voices expressing need for constitutional reform are drowned out by the political rhetoric that America is unique and the greatest in the world.

As it is known, the reason behind the shutdown was the disagreement of some Republicans on Obama’s healthcare reform dedicated to low-income Americans. However, the so-called tea partiers, who hate Obama, have not laid down their arms yet. They are convinced that they lost the battle but not the war and are just preparing for the upcoming skirmishes.

A well-known commentator, Stephan Richter, compares the U.S. present day situation to the period after the Civil War. Slavery was abolished and a bank was even set up to grant freed slaves loans. Yet, the defeated South refused to accept it and slavery lasted in practice for decades. Today, the same holds true for Obamacare.

Republicans do not want to come to terms with this reform. They refuse to finance it and refuse to improve the standard of living of the underprivileged. Richter — while true that he is an ardent leftist — suggests comparing the list of governors who refuse to expand healthcare for the poor, Medicaid, with the list of states fighting to preserve slavery. The surprising similarity shows that there is in fact a culture war going on in the U.S.

Finally, the problem of the national debt has been only postponed. Whether we like it or not, America leads the world as the largest and strongest economy. Its partners need this leadership, but they also need a clear message about the direction of the U.S. economic policy. The problem is that the Washington establishment has decided to use Scarlett O’Hara’s method from “Gone with the Wind” — “I’ll think about that tomorrow.”