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This is a bill of the swamp, by the swamp, and for the swamp. McConnell put together a team of 13 Republican Senators to cobble together a health care bill. Of those 13 Senators, nine have Blue Cross/Blue Shield listed as a major donor on opensecrets.org. Two of the four senators on McConnell’s health care dream team who don’t receive major donations from Blue Cross/Blue Shield — Ted Cruz and Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) — have become the bill’s most vocal critics.

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Sure, the Senate health care bill is better than the Obamacare status quo, but being a better health care solution than Obamacare is like being a better Batman than George Clooney or being a better daughter than Lizzie Borden. It’s like being more logical than Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) or less biased than CNN. In short, it’s not likely to earn you a confetti shower and a ticker-tape parade any time soon.

When the Senate health care bill fails, McConnell must be held accountable. After a 2016 election that signaled a clear anti-swamp mandate, how can Republicans in the Senate still follow a leader whose primary issue as an elected official has been protecting the power and influence of big donor PACs and lobbyists? A leader who assumed his Senate seat in those halcyon days of the mid 80s when Reagan was president, and the band Wham! was still together — a veritable poster boy for term limits? A leader who doomed this bill to failure both through process and content?

Nothing will be done for the sake of the middle class as long as Mitch McConnell is Senate majority leader, and that is anathema to the Trump mandate.

Eddie Zipperer is an assistant professor of political science at Georgia Military College and a regular LifeZette contributor.[lz_pagination]