United States Congress and The Minority Party

In congress their will be a party that becomes the minority, which makes it increasingly more difficult for that party to pass laws, and prevent the other party from acting upon their agenda. In our congress now as stated in the lecture notes the republican party is currently the minority, with the democrats then taking the majority. This majority from the democrats has helped President Obama immensely in passing his policy, including some major government stimulus package, which had little to no backing from the republican party. So then as the notes from class ask us what then really does the minority party do when it comes actually doing work.
I look at it like the minority party is there basically just to show their opposition, and give their reasons why. The minority party I think helps to inform the American people of what current policy or bill up for vote really contains, and usually points out the suspect portions of that bill which people may not support. What this then does is allow for the the people to openly voice their opinion, which could then result in more support against the bill than for it. From this activity against the bill the majority power could start to lose some of the members that are on the fence on an issue, and make them vote on the other side against their party. Also I feel the minority party is their because that is their job, they were voted into office many times because of what they stand for, now they have to stick to those morals that established and stand by the people who voted for them.
Where does this leave people then who are calling for bipartisanship? Well I feel they need to realize that bipartisanship really is not the best thing for the government. If everyone agrees on an issue I still feel you leave out some viewpoints of the American people. I also feel the country does not get fully informed of the true goings on in the government because they will on not take the time to be educated on the policy being discussed, but with an active group against what is being done they get informed of some of the negatives of the policy, which allows them to form an opinion.
We have seen much of this being done in the last months with Obama taking office and the majority of Congress being Democrats it is a great time for their policy to be passed, and it has happened quickly. At the same time the Republican minority in Congress have done a wonderful job of stating their opposition to the policy while also making sure to point out their reasons why. And now with more spending bills coming up their will be more promotion of it from the Democrats while the Republicans oppose.