"The world may soon be in a state of chaos, the Russians and Chinese are running rings around us on foreign policy, but all that seems to matter is putting it over on your political opposition."
The antics of lawmakers in Congress last week must have shocked and horrified millions of Americans as they witnessed the shenanigans.
The truth is, you are sent to Congress to work and pass or defeat legislation and serve your constituents. Amid all the huffing and puffing that seemed to get lost. The preening before the TV cameras, the huddled groups, the leaks, all just pointed out how far our democracy has fallen.
As Senator John Kennedy, Republican of Louisiana stated, “It’s hard to figure out how some of these people found their way down the birth canal.”
Senator John Kennedy, Republican of Louisiana stated, “It’s hard to figure out how some of these people found their way down the birth canal.”
Meantime, in the White House is a president who prefers to chomp the carpet with nasty tweets and threats than find a way to make the system work.
It is extraordinary to imagine what great hurt is being done to democracy by all these flatulent fools. Children and young adults watching must wonder what this abomination called democracy is.
During the closure debate, each politician was lying his or her eyes out, pretending it was all for the betterment of the people rather than a naked strategy to look good back home, whatever the cost.
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How this country is crying out for leadership now. A President Johnson or a President Reagan would have sliced through the bullbleep and forced a solution both sides could live with.
Just remember that Johnson passed civil rights, Medicare and Medicaid in the time the current crop of idiots have spent in this term of Congress.
The issues they choose to fight over are literally life and death. There was the children’s health care program, CHIP, that became a bargaining chip, and there were the young Dreamers, whose hopes of new lives in America safe from ICE pursuit were dashed once again.
"Kick the can down the road" has become the modus operandi of this and every recent Congress. There is no bipartisanship, no sense of fairness for both sides.
Republicans have become predatory, even singling out blue states to damage with budget cuts in order to rally their own troops.
Democrats have appeared ineffectual, not surprising when you look at the fact that leaders like Nancy Pelosi, 78, have long since passed their sell-by date yet insist on staying in power.
Nancy Pelosi.
The president, meanwhile, considers there can be only victory and defeat, no middle ground where both sides can agree and progress together.
Sean Wilentz, the presidential historian, last week rated Trump among the three worst presidents ever along with Andrew Buchanan and Andrew Johnson. There seems little doubt he will fall to the bottom of the class with his outlandish behavior.
Everything is politicized and weaponized. There are Republicans who want to go back to examine the Hillary Clinton emails, a flagrant waste of time and money.
Likewise, the FBI, CIA and State Department, the very engines of U.S. policy and democracy around the world, are being denigrated and diminished by continuous criticism.
The president’s family is making money hand over fist out of his office. He even got to charge his one year victory party at Mar-a-Lago to the Republican Party, thereby making money for his property.
The world may soon be in a state of chaos, the Russians and Chinese are running rings around us on foreign policy, but all that seems to matter is putting it over on your political opposition.
We can only hope that with spring approaching and the shutdown reversed, the better angels of our nature will come to the fore. Alas, that too, may be a pipe dream.
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