Let’s impeach Congress & start over from scratch
To the Times: Here in America we have a constitutional republic as our form of government. Our Constitution limits the power of office holders, protects the rights of minorities, and limits the dangers that may result from majority rule. The rule of law is all important and central to its purpose. The House of Representatives, Senate and chief executive are responsible for developing policies and passing laws designed to protect and benefit American citizens.
Although this system has been severely tested at times, overall it has worked fairly well. Congress and the chief executive have usually managed to work together to resolve their difficulties and enact legislation, even though they may represent different parties and philosophies.
That has not been the case recently, however, as President Trump and the Democrats are at loggerheads over the border wall and the government shutdown. Of course, their differences aren’t quite that simple, as this impasse goes back to the last administration when Republicans would not go along with some of President Obama’s pet projects and refused to even grant a hearing to Judge Merrick Garland, his Supreme Court nominee.
It was hardly surprising then, that payback time arrived for the Democrats when President Trump nominated Judge Brett Kavanaugh for the high court and they did their best to prevent his confirmation.
It was far from their finest hour for some of the Democratic members of the Senate Judiciary Committee as they grandstanded and pontificated, covering themselves not with glory but with shame. They further disgraced themselves by their treatment of Judge Kavanaugh, ignoring the presumption of innocence, and accepting unsubstantiated evidence as fact. As lawyers, all of them knew that was wrong. It was purely political, as were the mobs of anti-Kavanaugh demonstrators wandering the halls of congress harassing and confronting Republican committee members. It was all staged and rehearsed.
How did we get to this sorry point? The government shuts down and members of congress take a vacation when they should be working hard to find a solution? It was a dereliction of duty but easy to understand because the Democrats hate Donald Trump so much and they still cannot accept the reality that he beat their shoe-in candidate, Hillary Clinton. They are still bitter and refuse to give him credit for anything he has accomplished, attributing any successes he has had to his predecessor. They will not do anything to help him. Sabotaging Trump is far more important than taking action to protect Americans.
We are badly in need of border security and must find ways to fix our self-defeating immigration policies. What could be more important than protecting Americans by preventing illegals from entering our country? Democrats will not endorse a wall because Trump wants it. Their excuses for opposing it are flimsy. They have not offered an alternative to a wall and do not seem to be concerned about the dangers illegal immigration presents.
To quote Benjamin Franklin: “We have a republic, if we can keep it.” Too bad we don’t have someone with Ben’s wisdom around now to help us out.
What can we expect from this Congress? Will the present leadership reach an accommodation and work together or will we have gridlock and dysfunction?
Instead of impeaching the president, maybe we should impeach Congress and start from scratch. Could a brandnew Congress be any more ineffective than the one we have now?