Can Republicans go back to respecting the Constitution?

The midterm elections are over and most of the results are in. The Democratic Party held on to their slim U.S. Senate majority. The Republican Party eked out a slim majority in the U.S. House of Representatives. However, the much-hyped “red wave “or “red tsunami” never materialized. It was more like a red ripple or a wavelet (“Donald Trump announces he will run for president again in 2024 amid GOP losses, legal probes,” Nov. 15).

Now, the blame game has begun within the Republican Party with their bigwigs wondering why so many candidates lost the elections. Was it due to the inherently weak candidates who were endorsed by former President Donald Trump only because they were vocal MAGA supporters pushing the “Big Lie” that he kept repeating despite all evidence to the contrary and all the court cases he lost?

It is time for the GOP to do some soul searching and face the obvious truth: The party has lost its moral standing and credibility as a party of conservative values. Instead, it has become a party that shamelessly supported Trump despite his lies, crass behavior and lack of decency. The GOP was silent while the MAGA crowd pushed the

Big Lie, failed to impeach Trump not once, but twice, and downplayed the violent insurrection and attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, as “peaceful political discourse.”

One can only hope that some in the GOP will see the light and consider returning to honesty, integrity, empathy, kindness toward the less fortunate among us and, yes, even compromise with the Democrats when it would lead to legislation for the common good.

Could the GOP stop being the party of “no”? Stop pandering to lobbyists for Big Pharma and the NRA? Stop pushing for tax cuts for the rich? Having watched the way it has behaved over the last six years, I readily concede that it’s highly unlikely, but one can always dream the impossible dream, right?

For the sake of our fragile democracy and its institutions, it is to be hoped that there may be a few in the GOP that will actually abide by the oath they swore to respect and uphold the Constitution of the United States of America.