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I know that we are in the midst of an important election. So many of the letters the Times Leader receives and publishes are in support of the Republican candidate. They bemoan the dysfunction of our government in Washington, and scream loudly that we need change to make everything right for the future.
May I remind everyone that on the night of President Barack Obama’s inauguration, U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell gave Republicans their marching orders? He wanted to ensure that this president’s term would be for only four years. McConnell thought that by preventing passage of legislation President Obama proposed, he would be able to accomplish that goal.
Fortunately, Democrats across the country were not playing the game by his rules. President Obama was resoundingly re-elected. So Sen. McConnell kept blocking everything the president proposed. This is what produced our dysfunctional government. Wasting taxpayers’ money on 65 votes to end the Affordable Care Act, without any plan to replace it, is only one example. Refusing to take the steps necessary to appoint the nominee to the Supreme Court is only the latest.
These actions – and every one in between – were the work of a group of senators and representatives who could not, or would not, accept that the electorate chose not to be racist and elected a biracial man. He and his black wife and children are living in the White House.
The dysfunction in Washington lies at the Republican doorstep. The nomination of Donald Trump is just another way to say and do the same thing. They have made a mockery of our electoral process. Actions have consequences, and if that is what they set out to do, they really have succeeded.
But we still don’t have to march to their orders.
Eleanor Kandler Rodda
Shavertown