Last Wednesday, Representative John Boehner from Ohio was elected to be the 61st Speaker of the House by the new, Republican-controlled, House of Representatives. After tearfully accepting the almost comically large gavel, he launched into an acceptance speech that, among other things, reaffirmed campaign promises of  “respecting fairness in House debate” and “openness in the procedures of bills.”

Unfortunately, just a few weeks after an election that demonstrated voters’ eagerness for change and minutes after Boehner’s “can’t we all just get along” speech, the rekindled debate on repealing the health care law demonstrates that the only real change is which party is in control. Both Republicans and Democrats seem to be adhering to the same uncooperative pattern that plagued the last Congress.

In fact, the notion of the speaker calling for more cooperation and transparency is not a new idea to this Congress. At the beginning of Pelosi’s term for speaker in 2006, she called for her Congress to be “the most honest and open Congress in history.” In the years that followed, Republicans would complain about the lack of transparency and fairness in the House. For example, during the health care debate last spring, Republican Sen. Mike Johanns of Nebraska told CNN that Obama’s health care reform “is full of backroom deals and is currently being brokered behind closed doors” and that Republicans were “being shut out.”

At the time, there was truth to that claim. Republicans were not allowed to amend the health care bill or have a substantive debate on it. The major negotiating was between moderate and progressive Democrats, as there was little hope for Republicans to vote in favor of the bill. The final bill was rushed to the floor without any time to read it and passed by an incredibly small margin.

It should then come as no surprise that Speaker Boehner’s promises for more openness in the process, which are eerily similar to Pelosi’s pledge at the beginning of her term, reflect the frustration Republicans felt while they were in the minority.

However, at the same time he delivered his “heartfelt” speech regarding reforming the process, Boehner and the Republican leadership actively began doing the same things they had condemned just months earlier and, in a strange sense of déjà vu, Democrats are condemning the practices that they practiced just months earlier.

Republican majority leader Eric Cantor announced last Monday that the House will vote on repealing the health care law, rather uncreatively named the “Repealing the Job-Killing Health Care Law Act of 2011,” without hearings, amendments, or open debate. For their part, the Democratic leadership wrote a scathing letter accusing Republicans of being insincere for bringing “major legislation to the floor without any public hearings.”

It is odd that only a year ago, the two parties were in the exact opposite position with Republicans accusing Democrats of making a mockery of transparency after the health care reform bill was taken to the floor without the possibility of amendments. What is even odder than the hypocrisy on both sides is that we are debating a repeal bill that has absolutely no chance of making it into law. If for whatever reason it is actually passed by the Democrat-controlled Senate, which it won’t, then it is guaranteed to receive a veto from President Obama.

These failings are tragic, but there is still hope for the institution of Congress. After all, at the end of the last Congress, many members on both sides of the aisle threw off the far wings of their party to come together and pass both a tax cut package that leaned toward conservative ideals and the progressive repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. While the merits of these two bills can be debated, the fact that the two sides compromised for the good of America cannot be.

As naïve as it sounds, more compromises and bipartisanship might be seen on the horizon, especially since Democrats control the Senate and Republicans control the House. Only time will tell. Until then, we can only hope that promises made by Representative Nancy Pelosi and Speaker John Boehner will be kept.

John Brinkerhoff is a freshman majoring in political science and communication studies.