Republicans are showing more eagerness to blame one another for defeat on health care than they ever did to gain a victory. After the House leadership’s health-care bill had to be pulled from the floor for lack of votes, the party’s various factions read from their familiar scripts. Speaker of the House Paul Ryan’s allies lashed out at the conservative die-hards in the House Freedom Caucus for rejecting the bill. Those conservatives blamed Ryan in return, saying he had given them a lousy bill — one that a significant number of Republicans on the left and in the middle of their House conference had also rejected. Trump critics blamed Trump for his erratic leadership.
None of these groups is entirely right. But a just apportionment of blame should be secondary to moving health policy in a conservative direction, which is still achievable in this Congress if Republicans turn their attention from their rivalries to that task.
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