Feb 27, 2020 3 min read

I have voted in every presidential election since turning 21 in 1970. Party didn’t matter to me. I voted for the person I believed would advance this country and its values. The last election, I voted for someone who was going to secure our southern border with Mexico footing the bill; who was going to provide the best health care for all; who was going to protect Social Security and Medicare; and most importantly, who was going to drain the swamp and get rid of lobbyists and special interest groups. I thought this was going to be the person who was going to make the same old, do-nothing politics of Washington a thing of the past. Maybe America really could be great again.

It didn’t take long to realize how we all had become like contestants on the TV show, “The Apprentice.” Within the first two years, we have a no-Mexican-paid-for-wall fiasco on our southern border. We have a tax cut designed for the extra rich and pushed through Congress by the Senate members who benefitted the greatest by it. Coming with it were trillion-dollar deficits that created social program cuts as the only solution this Congress can see to rein in deficit spending. We have a pending case in federal court to eliminate Obamacare supported by the person who was going to create the best health care program on earth but with no congressional plan to replace it. We are the laughingstock of the world, closer to becoming involved in another never-ending conflict in the Middle East than we were before the 9/11 terrorist attacks. 

To the so-called politicos in this area: We have just experienced on the world stage the impeachment of our president. None of this should have happened. It only happened because our president thought he could get away with it. With all of his so-called business savvy, why would he attempt something so stupid? This was aid voted upon and passed by both houses of Congress. The Mueller probe had just cast another dark cloud over his term. Why would he not approach Congress and say he was concerned about corruption in Ukraine and wanted to withhold aid until an investigation had been done? A simple request legally, within his powers, and none of what we experienced over the past several months would have happened. 

Some of us could have had the sour taste removed from our mouths, and just possibly had a real president. So sad we don’t.

Ralph E. George

Washington