As elections are nearing, lawmakers are more partisan than ever and the two parties are almost sabotaging each other each step of the lawmaking process. The razor-thin majority that Democrats enjoy in both houses does not help either with things going ahead, as partisan attitude on both sides, especially on the Republican side, are hindering the very future of this nation.

As if this wasn't enough, members of Congress will be away from Washington much of the fall to tend to their re-election and to push for their party's presidential candidate.

Meanwhile, the Congress went on the 4th of July vacation without being able to pass the bill that would have prevented a 10.6 percent cut in doctors’ wages and which would have cut the subsidies the government makes to private insurers.

If the bill would have passed, it would have facilitated senior citizens’ access to medical care, because the doctors would have been more likely to accept such patients, and because they would have had to pay lesser fees to insurance companies to get the medical services they would need.

President Bush was one of the people who put pressure on Congress to reject the bill by saying that he would veto against it if it would have passed. This was one of the Republicans’ excuses to motivate their votes against it. Both the Democrats and the Republicans rushed to accuse each other on the matter, starting a war of declarations.

The Republicans said that they would have voted for the bill provided they had some opportunity to modify it. The wage cut for the doctors will be effective starting with July 15.