The Hawk Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Randy Miller column [The Hawk Eye, Burlington, Iowa]

Sept. 30--So here we are on the brink of a government shutdown because U.S. House Republicans just cannot stop throwing hissy fits over Obamacare.

In a story in this newspaper last Thursday, Sen. Tom Harkin, the reasonable senator from Iowa, called the GOP antics "reckless" and "childish" and labeled the House maneuvering "threats" and "tantrums."

Lots of folks have questions about the implementation of the federal Affordable Care Act, commonly called Obamacare, including many Democrats.

But Senate Democrats are not about to cave into House Republicans' demands that they defund Obamacare and start all over. The battles have been fought and won and Obamacare is the law of the land. Even the U.S. Supreme Court agrees.

So how else can you characterize Republicans' refusal to budge on the issue, even after 42 House votes that failed to go anywhere in the Senate? They have possession of the ball in the House and they're not going to let the Democrats play, nahnah, nahnah, nah, nah.

Democrats have been saying for months they know the law will need to be tweaked to adjust to the realities of the modern workplace, but they're not about to throw the baby out with the bath water. Do the House tea partiers not understand plain English?

American-style governance has always been messy. Tradeoffs and backroom deals and amendments. Look no further than the last few months of the Abraham Lincoln presidency for a case in point.

Passage of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution outlawing slavery in America very nearly died in the -- you guessed it -- U.S. House of Representatives. It passed Jan. 31, 1865, just prior to the end of the Civil War. The Senate had passed it nearly a year earlier, in April, 1864.

Lincoln was a Republican and did a lot of dealmaking and political maneuvering to obtain passage of the 13th Amendment, but were he a U.S. senator today, I think he'd be embarrassed by the modern members of his party in the House.

What is it about the U.S. House that makes it seem so childish compared to the more staid and deliberative Senate? Are all those House members simply grappling for individual power, or grandstanding, or do they simply enjoy being childish because there's so darned many of them and they can hide behind their leadership?

Part of the problem, I think, is that representatives are perpetually campaigning because they have to stand for re-election every two years. I fear the days of the reasonable Republican are numbered. There are no more Jim Leachs out there.

Leach served 15 terms and was so middle of the road, thoughtful and willing to compromise that the Democrats could not touch him until the Second District trended sufficiently Democrat that Dave Loebsack was able to defeat him in 2006, largely due to a big turnout in Johnson County.

Multiply the local political exigencies across the country and it's easy to see why 435 representatives see their positions from a local perspective versus a national one. They literally must listen to their electorate if they wish to stay in office.

And, let's face it, recent polls show Obamacare is not popular with a plurality of the American people. But let's not forget that Social Security did not have a plurality either when it was enacted under the Franklin Roosevelt administration. Lots of folks believed it was the beginning of a socialist society and capitalism was doomed.

Of course, today we know Social Security for what it really is, a good program that provides a safety net for millions of Americans who could not afford to live without it. And we all pay for it through payroll tax deductions.

I hope to begin collecting my SS check within a year. I've been paying into the fund for about 50 years now, so I'm ready to cash out.

And as for Obamacare, I have no doubt that when all the heated rhetoric is vented and kinks in the law are worked out, it will be a good thing for America, too.

Our health care system is broken, and passage of this law, I'm convinced, will help fix that system, one way or another.

Health insurance providers had decades to fix the problems themselves, but for whatever greedy reasons, they simply chose not to. It's time their power is checkmated. And if it takes Obamacare, to do that, I'm all for it.

Have you seen one of the most beautiful buildings in downtown Des Moines? It's a big, bright glass-and-steel structure. It's the Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield building.

Guess who's health care dollars built that building? And what do they do in that building? They broker payments, acting as God deciding who gets paid, how much they get paid and who pays the rest of the bill.

That would be your health care dollars at work, both for you and against you. We have to be able to do better than that.

Every president since Harry Truman has attempted to get some sort of national health care law enacted. But the health care lobby always was too strong.

Finally, not anymore. And House Republicans need to grow up.

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