People Are Beginning To Chafe At Political Inaction

One of the wonders of our age has been the disconnect between increasingly-urgent problems in the country, and a Congress slouching towards inaction. For whatever political issue and from whatever political stance, inaction is the watchword.

People are beginning to get fed up.

I like the over-the-top rhetoric in this editorial about immigration. Got to start somewhere!:

The following opinion by Rebecca Lockhart, speaker of the Utah House of Representatives, was received by the Daily Herald on Friday.

...This year, the Utah Legislature formulated a potential solution for Utah after growing tired of waiting for our completely dysfunctional federal government to act. A package of four bills was signed into law that proposes comprehensive reform including enforcement measures and a guest worker program that provides funding to fight identify theft and fraud. It's a plan that involved painful compromise from all sides and is now being lauded across the country as model legislation.

Not everyone is happy with it, including some members of the Legislature, but as a body we're proud of the work we've done. Like most legislation, we'll keep working to iron out any remaining kinks.

But after all our efforts, after the blood, sweat and yes, tears, where is our federal delegation when we ask for support? They run for cover wherever they can find it or throw rocks at those trying to make a difference.

Congressman Jim Matheson feels so strongly about the issue that he gives it a total of four sentences on his "Issues" page. Rep. Jason Chaffetz and Sen. Mike Lee dismissed the efforts out of hand. Rep. Chaffetz says it's unconstitutional. But that's why we built in a two-year delay -- to apply for and receive a waiver to show what we can do. Sen. Lee says he doesn't think a federal waiver is an option. How about he propose federal legislation to make it an option? Sen. Orrin Hatch said he couldn't help us. Congressman Bishop remains curiously silent. These self-proclaimed champions of states' rights didn't even give us the courtesy of pointing to Utah as an example of what could be a starting point at the federal level.

Our federal delegation has watched the Legislature do the heavy lifting to get immigration reform off the ground, while their political will atrophies in the airless echo chamber of Washington, D.C. We bleed in the trenches while they wallow in the temporary glory of meaningless blood-boiling rhetoric. Immigration is just one more in a long list of examples where states bear the brunt of failed federal policy. Meanwhile, Congress benefits politically from an ongoing untenable situation. They refuse to take the risks necessary in order to tackle the issue and implement solutions.