I have been and continue to be public in my enthusiastic support for Hillary Clinton for U.S. President.
I have supported her as a leader since before the Minnesota Precinct Caucuses in February, 2008. She is a leader I have long admired.
More on that “below the fold”….
This is a very long post (over 5000 words) because of comments, and it could be much longer still. Thus, the items are presented in sections (1, 2, etc.). Section 2 relates to my personal endorsement. I’d also recommend Sections 1 and 4. Also, #6 “A FINAL THOUGHT” is at the very end of the post.
Related Post: The Newspaper; Government by Twitter here.
(click to enlarge photos)

Hillary Clinton, St. Paul MN, Feb 12, 2016

1. First, here’s an invitation to do a brief personal inventory of yourself:
Pick one personal imperfection that you have.
Pick one mistake that you made that may have impacted someone else.
(Then, take these two – call them “failings: – strictly basing them on your own perception of what “failing” means.)
Now, imagine that an enemy gets a hold of one of these imperfections and decides to use it against you, “no holds barred”. The attack doesn’t have to be true. Still, a microscope is focused in on it, and it is broadcast relentlessly, with an intention of destroying your reputation.
And, if you have a spouse or partner, imagine that spouses or partners alleged faults are used against you as well. [NOTE Aug. 4, 2016: Just today, from a far left wing friend, comes a picture of Chelsea Clinton smiling with Ivanka Trump, Donald Trump’s daughter, as if there is a presumption of guilt by association. The message at the beginning: “please share widely”. There is, as usual, no words of where this forward originated, or context, or anything else…. Apparently the photo was published in People magazine, though that is likely not the originator of the “forward”. It is not only the right wing (see #5 below) that is into the character assassination game.]
This has been the fate of Hillary Clinton for at least the last 25 years, and the technique has worked well.
What has been and is being done to Hillary Clinton is classic bullying, and there are surprising participants in that bullying of a respected public figure.
(I once saw bullying play out with good friends, whose middle school daughter was so relentlessly bullied by some of her “friends”, through vicious e-mails, that they finally sold their house and moved to a different city. The “friends” could still persecute their target from a distance – it was e-mail, after all – but, being young teens, sooner or later they lost interest: the daughter has since graduated from college, and is a great credit to her generation and her parents, but still bears the scars.)
Bullies derive their power from bystanders who in various ways enable outrageous behavior.
Keep this in mind when your “trust” needle changes when talk turns to Hillary because of something you heard, or “feel”…. You, too, can be a carrier of a vicious disease which would be, if you were in public school as a student, be a punishable offense. Bullying is not entertainment.
2. MY SUPPORT FOR HILLARY CLINTON.
My support for Hillary Clinton does go back to February 2008 when, at the Precinct Caucus, I wrote on my piece of paper, “Hillary Clinton”, for 2008 Presidential preference, and publicly said it.
The other major choice was Barack Obama, later elected as President.
I had seen Barack Obama in person three days earlier, on Feb. 2, in Minneapolis.

Candidate Obama February 2, 2008, in Minneapolis MN

My story of my choosing Hillary is in three e-mails, from early February, 2008, written to my e-mail listserv at the time. You can read the e-mails here (three pages), and they speak for themselves: Hillary Clinton 2008001.
Succinctly, I felt Hillary Clinton was better prepared for the brutally challenging office of President than Senator Obama. She already had seven full years of service as U.S. Senator for the state of New York; and at the very beginning of her first term, 9-11-01 happened on her watch, and in her own state.
And that was just for starters.
She was (and is) without any question competent and courageous.
The gender issue was no issue at all for me: as a former executive director, I had worked regularly under women Presidents since 1975.
Of course, we now have had over seven years of the presidency of Barack Obama who, I believe, will go down in history as one of the most outstanding and transformative presidents we have ever had. He will be very hard to top.
The agenda of the opposing party was to make President Obama fail for the entirety of his presidency. They failed at their failure agenda; nonetheless, they damaged severely particularly our middle class.
Rather than treat Hillary Clinton as a vanquished rival; Barack Obama appointed her to the nation (and probably the worlds) top (and most demanding) diplomatic position: Secretary of State of the United States. And in that post, she supervised near 70,000 employees who are posted in every nation of the world. She performed admirably.
The bullies have transformed her role into words: think “Benghazi”, and “e-mail”…and all the other assorted insults that get lapped up like delicious food for gossip….
Hillary Clinton is extraordinarily competent, and with a positive toughness rarely seen in men or women.
She remains consistently the worlds most admired woman.
The 2016 campaign will rage on for the next 100 days. If you’ve got the “trust issue” hang-up about Hillary, I hope you give it up.
Get off the Bullies team.
Oh, and by the way, that young woman whose parents had to move to another city to get away from the teen age girl bullies?
Some years later, October 13, 2008, to be specific, (photos below) she was called on to introduce Michelle Obama at a Twin Cities campaign stop at Macalester College. She did a wonderful job. We were honored to be there.
I’m sorry I need to leave out her name and her image below, but that is her, hugging Mrs. Obama…that’s sort of how it goes in this world. My young friend was a powerful witness to resilience.

October 13, 2008, Introducing Michelle Obama in St. Paul

Michelle Obama October 13, 2008, Minnesota

And where does this leave Bernie and the Progressives.

Bernie Sanders, St. Paul MN, Feb 12, 2016

Many, perhaps most, of my core beliefs have always fit with the progressive mindset though I am, as I self-describe on this page, a “moderate, pragmatic Democrat”. I do feel alienated from the progressive movement. There has been too much of a “my way or the highway” approach by progressives to working within and thus with the much larger and more dynamic political system. Too often they are against, not for…
In an odd sense, they are too often identical twins to the Tea Party radicals – the ones who dominate the Trump rallies, and this years Republican Convention – albeit with much less publicity and strength. Their strength is too often buried under righteous anger: war hasn’t ended (and won’t, unfortunately), etc.
As anyone knows who has an “other half”, or lives next door to someone, or in some neighborhood, society is not perfect.
Too many of those with a progressive point of view seem to have forgotten how to work together for incremental change, replacing it with demands.
The progressives, this time, thus far, have achieved a great deal within the American political system, making their views known in the platform of the Democratic party. When I first noticed Bernie Sanders rally in Minneapolis back in May, 2015, I was skeptical that the progressive movement could come together. (See the final portion of that post.)
The progressives did make a strong showing at the Democrat National Convention. But as anyone who works in particularly the political field knows, success at a Convention is really just the beginning, not the end. There is about 100 days to go, and there are far more important political races, local and state and national, than simply the nominee for presidency of the United States.
Then comes the years which follow the election….
I hope the progressives build on their success by working as part of, rather than seeking to dominate, the conversation going forward.
Unfortunately, I think if Donald Trump wins, it will be because too many progressives “join the parade”, by not even voting in November, or sitting on their hands.
I hope I’m wrong.
3. COMMENTS:
3A from Norm:
Excellent, Dick!
Yes, anyone who has been in public office and/or in the public eye in important positions as has Hillary will always be easy to attack for this or that position or vote take or whatever. That is just too easy to do if that is what one wants to do to justify his/her support for another candidate.
It is interesting to note that Sanders was not a Democrat in spite of the accommodations that the DNC made on his behalf to include him in the debates as well as to give him lots of face time while in the city of Brotherly Love enjoying a steak sandwich or two.
Sanders has also made it clear that he plans to return to the Senate as an independent just as he was before and where he was an ineffective senator getting only one serious piece of legislation passed during his tenure there, a bi-partisan effort on behalf of veterans with Sen. McCain.
Bloomberg BusinessWeek recently noted that many of the progressive liberal senators elect to that august body at the same time of Sanders have been much more effective in terms of moving the progressive agenda forward let alone getting some of it adopted than has Sanders.
Thanks again, Dick.
3B From Peter:
I look at this in a larger context (larger doesn’t mean “better” although we ordinarily frame it so unconsciously). The system in which Hillary Clinton is so well-qualified to function as President is bankrupt, corrupt and stuck in relentless boom-and-bust cycles that are NOT simply “the way it is”; these cycles are built into “capitalism” as it is practiced today. The poor, marginalized and disenfranchised are helpless and inevitable victims of this system. It is NOT the only possible system, and not even the only possible “realistic” system. None of the alternatives are the “opposite” of “capitalism”, as many would argue. And I don’t see how the present one is going to be changed other than by collapsing from its own inherent instability. That will be one of the worst ways to get rid of it, but one way or another it is going to end. Scale is key to this. A subject for another article.
I am among those who see that none of the three viable candidates so far will ever be able to deliver on what they promise: they will be riding a much bigger wave of cultural imperatives than they even perceive, and are as helpless to make substantive change as the poorest, starvingest, doomed-est among us. They are all part of the system that must be changed.
And it must be changed, or our grandchildren will very likely not survive at all. We face the most certain and dreadful future imaginable, and yet there doesn’t seem to be the usual violent rebellion brewing anywhere at a scale that could do much about the status quo; and I doubt that such a cataclysm could do anything positive in any category of “success”. It is a new kind of problem that requires a completely new way of being, and not just a Great Man or Great Woman to ride in and save us.
I recommend reading Howard Richards on the subject, and will forward his latest article. [read it here: Howard Richards001 Meanwhile, I will probably hold my nose and vote for her, knowing that the other candidate is also a logical result of the times, and may very well win, and then everything will go to hell much, much faster.
Vote in hopes of a Supreme Court that won’t revive lynching and witch-trials.
3B1. Dick, in response: I admire Peter (see his recent post at this space here). I always wonder, though, about a not unusual response about voting, “hold my nose”.
Maybe Peter didn’t notice that my comments about Sanders/Progressives (here) were in a blog post about “The Commons”. My understanding of our society is that it is a motley crew, indeed, and any leader, particularly President, has to be profoundly aware of that reality, which is far from the perfection demanded by idealists of any stripe. There’s the old saying, “the enemy of the good is the perfect”, or some such. If one holds out for the perfect, and only “hangs” with those who have the true faith, disappointment is guaranteed.
The Democratic party is a motley crew, and I like that. The Republican party of Lincoln long ago disintegrated and is for the time being at least the party of Trump.
3C. from Joyce comes an interesting commentary from “The Weekly Sift”, a New Hampshire Blogger: Why Bernie Backed Hillary.
3D. from Nancy:
I appreciate the attached column that will be in the next YES! magazine issue from David Korten. This expresses succinctly my current thinking.
David Korten is worth knowing about. I first heard of him as the author of When Corporations Rule the World written 20 years ago. He is the editor of YES! magazine. Here’s a good link to read more. When one speaks of “Bernie progressives,” he fits the bill to a T, and has for as long as Bernie has.
Here’s a link to the YES! article.
The most essential “revolution” is “human revolution.”
In these politically charged times, I reflect on these words from Ben Okri, Nigerian author and poet.
You can’t remake the world
without remaking yourself.
Each new era begins within.
It is an inward event,
with unsuspected possibilities
for inner liberation.
3E. From Peter (2nd comment, Aug 3)
From the comments to my bit of verbiage, it appears that the popular narratives are covered well. I just want to put in a word for something Bernie represents that I think is being overlooked. The popular discourse lumps him dismissively with Nader and – um – the Republican candidate, which only diverts attention from his clear and widely-supported message. And after all, the man did concede and support Clinton.
Being he is my Senator, I know a little about him. He’s a WYSIWYG [What You See Is What You Get] kind of guy. And what he’s done is to speak quite widely understood truth of the kind that the robber barons and despoilers and war profiteers cannot survive if it is not repressed. And it resonated with the conversation going on off-camera out in America – because they were already painfully aware of what he was talking about. Were it not for corporate money, Bernie would be the nominee hands down. This does have a real impact in our real lives. I’m glad for him, that he did not get nominated, because I really like the man. But his promises were not empty, and I’d have loved to see a Sanders Presidency. I think we still may end up with a Ryan.
Ralph Nader is often invoked as an example of the perfect-as-enemy-of-the-good. This is interesting, qualifying Ralph as the “perfect” part of that equation. But it isn’t a balanced equation. Like Bernie he is clear-eyed and honest about what really matters to most people, which boils down to being good stewards of our world, in which we are at best transients. Both Ralph and Bernie walk their talk all the way, and it’s discoverable in the public record. This cannot be said of the others, and not just from “bullying”.
But the argument is always reduced to whether one should go-along-to-get-along, or hold out on principle at all cost (losing the election). That is an unanswerable question, and a false dichotomy. It favors, heavily, the triumph of mediocrity, or worse, the lowest common denominator. And it is refuted only if everybody musters up the courage to vote as they really think. I’ve seen it happen locally (I take the Minutes for five school boards and a town) (and take the Bernard teachings to heart!), but on the national scale I’m not sure it can be brought about.
If a Ralph or a Bernie does not stand up once in a while and articulate the bald truths that we all know (maybe under various layers of resignation or denial), we will be much the worse for it. And these two have done that: they have not painted a slanted picture, they have pointed to what is easily verifiable experience. Neither of them stands to gain personally from this effort. And the counter-arguments are shoot-the-messenger, or fear-mongering, or just louder; never engaging with the message.
Democracy is predicated on people voting their conscience. This is often thought of as “unrealistic”. So we profess what we do not act upon. The logic of voting “strategically” instead of conscientiously is much like a search engine that shows you more and more of what you “want” based on past behaviors. There is no possibility in past-based predictions, only more of the same. And stuff gets sold. Including us, sitting there “browsing”.
I said “hold my nose” because there is no other candidate who is not the Republican Nominee to vote for, and I think that individual is a true psychopath. More of the same will be much, much better than what that individual would surely bring down on us. He has already done real harm.
I am quite sure that Clinton will continue (and enhance) the war and financial and corporate policies of all her predecessors. She is not a visionary by any measure. Clinton has long experience comparable to being the captain of the Titanic. A good technician, highly skilled and no doubt well-intentioned. But the machine is a war machine, a feudal machine, and it will not operate another way without a major overhaul.
Some tiny fragments of the quite realistic vision so well articulated by Sanders and others will at least force lip service from the next administration – yes, even that one. The Supreme Court might be moderated a smidgin, but only if Congressional gridlock is broken in the House and Senate elections; it can also go horribly wrong. I don’t believe we will see any decrease in the resource wars, the mass displacements of millions, or the targeted extra-judicial killings (by drone). And those, unlike many of the horrible prospects we face, are within the purview of the American President. On “Day One”.
Why are we not demanding this? That’s another story.
3F. From Jeff: [Possibly responding to #5 from “John”, below] My favorite and I have seen it often, is the hard virulent anti Clinton folks (who are also anti Obama in a big way)
Who always list the parade of half truths and outright lies fed by the extreme right wing media. And
Then tell you to “Educate yourself” (honestly I have heard this one many times from these people)
Using the term educate in this case is always ironic to me.
I think the most important thing that Mr Khan has brought to the public arena is the word and term “empathy” as it concerns leaders in general. I find that not only folks like Trump, but for the most part the pushers of virulence and their believers all are lacking in empathy.
Of course “empathy” is a “soft” virtue, and America needs strong hard leadership for them.
3G. from Carol: This has been posted on the WaPo [Washington Post?] comments:
“The Hare Psychopathy Checklist includes the following: Grandiose sense of self worth, crudely insulting, refusal to accept blame, superficial charm, need for stimulation, constant bragging, pathological lying, lack of remorse, feeling victimized, emotionally shallow, impulsive, desire for attention, Machiavellian, aggressive, narcissistic, lacking empathy, sensation seeking, arrogant, multiple marriages, promiscuous, and poor behavioral control. Having half of these identifies one as a likely psychopath.”
Then there’s this, which you’ve probably seen, which I sent to my cousin:
from https://justabovesunset.wordpress.com
“All of this leads Robert Kagan, one of the original neoconservatives…, to suggest that there is something very wrong with Donald Trump:
One wonders if Republican leaders have begun to realize that they may have hitched their fate and the fate of their party to a man with a disordered personality. We can leave it to the professionals to determine exactly what to call it. Suffice to say that Donald Trump’s response to the assorted speakers at the Democratic National Convention has not been rational.
Why denigrate the parents of a soldier who died serving his country in Iraq? And why keep it going for four days? Why assail the record of a decorated general who commanded U.S. forces in Afghanistan? Why make fun of the stature of a popular former mayor of New York? Surely Trump must know that at any convention, including his own, people get up and criticize the opposition party’s nominee. They get their shots in, just as your party got its shots in. And then you move on to the next phase of the campaign. You don’t take a crack at every single person who criticized you. And you especially don’t pick fights that you can’t possibly win, such as against a grieving Gold Star mother or a general. It’s simply not in your interest to do so.
This is not normal:
The fact that Trump could not help himself, that he clearly did, as he said, want to “hit” everyone who spoke against him at the Democratic convention, suggests that there really is something wrong with the man… If you are a Republican, the real problem, and the thing that ought to keep you up nights as we head into the final 100 days of this campaign, is that the man cannot control himself. He cannot hold back even when it is manifestly in his interest to do so…
Imagine such a person as president. What we have seen in the Trump campaign is not only a clever method of stirring up the anger in people. It is also a personality defect that has had the effect of stirring up anger. And because it is a defect and not a tactic, it would continue to affect Trump’s behavior in the White House… His ultimately self-destructive tendencies would play out on the biggest stage in the world, with consequences at home and abroad that one can barely begin to imagine.”

Watching the 1960 Election Returns at Valley City (ND) State Teachers College

4. The Quandary of the Republican Party (which extends to every one of us)
Back in October, 1996, I was watching CNN, as I usually did in those days, and Cong. Newt Gingrich was commenting on something or other. Whatever it was, I remember that I knew it was a flat-out bald-faced lie, and he was looking me square in the eye through the boob-tube.
It so incensed me that I turned off the TV (I was single, then, and didn’t have to seek permission!) and deserted the wasteland of television for a number of years.
After the 1996 election, I sat down and wrote a piece on politics, as I saw it, then, comparing it to politics as I remembered it in the 1960 presidential election – the one between Kennedy and Nixon. You can read the entire reflection here: 1996 Political Campaign001.
Re-reading that 20-years ago reflection, I am struck by how naive I was, then.
What caused me to turn off the television then was kind and gentle compared to today, and the nasty stuff for this election season is just beginning….
The “quandary” for today’s Republican party (which is mostly in exile at the moment), is that Donald Trump, and the yet-to-be-officially named Trump Party, represent the achievement of the goals of the Republican times of Lee Atwater, Carl Rove, Tom Delay, Grover Norquist, Ralph Reed and their ilk. They were turned loose to do whatever it took to win.
The problem is that they were too successful. It is sort of like creating a Frankenstein monster which doesn’t stay within the boundaries set for it. It just runs amuck, leaving its creators to scatter in all directions and try to figure out what to do now.
From my amateur (but very interested) vantage point, there were some recent turning points where crass (and potentially catastrophic) decisions were made by the Republican leadership.
For just a single example (and, of course, none of this is provable, but pretty obvious to me):
Hillary Clinton was viewed early on as a formidable future opponent, and since the very first, about 25 years ago, perhaps even longer, she was targeted for smear after smear after smear.
She just wouldn’t fall.
I remember in the relatively recent past when Sen. Lindsay Graham, himself a possible candidate for President, but already an also-ran, looked the camera in the eye as Newt had in 1996, and declares his revulsion for, if I remember right, Donald Trump, but nonetheless had to add the nutgraf of the party that Hillary was a liar. It was a distinct mixed message. His party enemy was subverted by the official loathing of Hillary Clinton.
Then came the more recent time when virtually the entire Republican party leadership structure, after publicly loathing Trump through the primaries, conceded that he’d won, and essentially swore allegiance to his candidacy.
My “spin” on this: they thought they could garner more votes by lassoing this wild horse and keep him in control while in the White House.
Now, my guess is, they are doing the “devils dance” of “what do we do now?”
The dance will not be accompanied by openness and honesty, of course.
And in the meantime every single one of us will be victims, not only to the farce of the campaign, but to the results afterwards.
All of us share the blame. We need to figure this out.
5. From “John” (not his real name), an example of the virulent anti-Hillary argument presented unburdened by defensible evidence. This is from a person we befriended and helped when he needed help, who has apparently now found religion and “flipped” almost in an instant. This is presented as received, without editing. (See also comment 3F above)
Dick Bernard,
After reading your blog about the basis of your justification in the Democratic Party and how you form your political views of Hillary R. Clinton, I can justly call you a uneducated, main-stream biased, mind-controlled victim of historical factual democratic Alinsky tactics learned by both Hillary Hinton and Barack Muslim Brotherhood Obama’s war on the USA a state double-dipping t0 enrich the billion already obtaind via voices or POTUS, and Secretary of State right under the medial ignored bias non -journalists and influence peddling.
I find it incredulous that you speak about the Democratic Party with such admiration
despite the history of it’s founders, under the guise of social justice for our Black Lives Maters uneducated members forefather’s plantation’s slave labor force were moved from the servitude to the new plantation i,e , ghetto of the freed slave migration to the ghettoes of the new cities containment areas,
Flask Dick!!!!!!! Obama is a self proclaimed hater of the USA, it’s constitution, for which he shows little regard and his secretive Presidential decrees/directives espousing Agenda 21, common core, and the ill-legal boarders policy. Parents of communists leanings, a homosexual that denies it for political gain with a ” wife of the same gender as himself”. His mind control handler is a Syrian- Valarie, Jarret. Co instantly, Hillary has a love interest In Huma Abedin, who is also a Syrian. What are the odds.husband has done and is proud of this fact,She has slept with more women than her, smooth, Happy cocaine induced slick Willie
Go see the highly documentary. ” Hillary’s America ” and see what is in store for you and Cathy! You might learn something who use the KKK for enforcement agenda, and how it contuse today. You won’t be so self edifying and self-righteous in calling yourself a Democrat anymore. Fact Dick- no Republicans owned or abused slaves.
EDUCATE YOUSELF FOR ONCE AND ALL. However, I bet you will vote for Hillary “Goldie Sacs” Clinton just because your family has always been DEMOCRATIC
Hillary Clinton’s agenda is clearly going by her close connection to the history of the Democratic Party’s strict adhesion to the 1. Political agnosticism 2. Lack of any strategy beside a brutal attack, denial, forgetfulness in the Akinsky (playbook of rules)
Hillary is a good pupil of this communist community activist, so much so, Her college thesis was the admiration enough to devote an entire Thesis entitled.”This is the Only Fight”. The Clinton Foundation has promoted the group as a tax exempt,philenthropic agend. Ask any Hatian it they sent the money they promised.
as also a money laundering operation of Interests of the Billions of donations for political beneficial influence exchange of foreign political deals, especially with the Soviets, Uzbekistan’s, uranium dealings,The worst is that she has shared national security with the War ready Communists (she affectionately calls then the progressives of the’great push of the uS into the Goblal Family of the non-associated green house gases that is causing such a worrisome scenario.
I will say that your blog is of little relevance as to the important events of the present age. I stand with the patriotic Americans that would vote for a loose lipped American
patriot than a lying, closeted ledbian whose relationship was fomed years before the marriage was agreed to be one of convienence, One who beats her opponents with her fists as is the case with Bill Clinton’s black SHINNERS, OR HAS THEM diposed of after then were bullied and shot themselves in the White Houseand moved for the sake of getting in the way of her megalomania.
Like mother like daughter, Chelsea is a basard whose real father is obvious from her
quite remarkable Rose Law firm lawyer father,
Any first Lady that has a profound hatred for her secret servive defenders protecting her and the condisending manner she talk down to those”little people “of the white staff tells me see is a demonic person that all that deal with her have little good to say for just being the dirt under her self gandious status of there 40+ years of politiacal hatred of the uSA.
I hope the mole/ possible oral syphilis leasion on her tongue, or brain damage to noy come outl fainting is a sign that she dies before turning over the prize she has achieved in nearing God help s all)
You are the product of writing xgrandpop to grandchild family history, your rembrances, of the by gone , happy memories of a typical self-trubador of North Dakota minutia, that you should be written in a journal and not babble on like the senile grandpop who feels his life had some sembulance of history, and reason for your 77 years of rural farm life messaging, only important to a decline old man! Take a walk in the morning and continue
of the time it reminds you of your younger years in NO, Dakota!
PEACE WILL NOT BE ON THE WORDS THAT OBAMA CAN”T UTTER,”I ALLOWED MORE IHADIST MUSLIMS IN TODAY . TRANSPARENCY STILL WORKS ON THE BRAIN_WASHED!
6, A FINAL THOUGHT FROM DICK:
Our apparently former friend, “John”, above, has caught the wave of the long-time Republican strategy to effectively “kill” people like me. He symbolizes the currently awful state of the current American political conversation, and there are a lot of outliers like him at the Trump rallies. For a long while he has depended on the exact same government he truly seems to despise. It isn’t rational, but it’s how he obviously sees things.
The “American people” are not like John – just look around you – but we seem to consciously put up with vicious winner-take-all politics, where political advertising is intended to manipulate our behavior.
The Congress of the United States, which rarely gets even close to a 20% approval rating from the public it is elected to serve, and dips to almost non-existent levels, in a weird sort of way represents who we want in our “leaders”, especially the Tea Party crew on the far right. We always tend to reelect Congressional incumbents. Our own Congressperson, I guess we say, is different.
Cathy and I once sat in the gallery of the House of Representatives on an evening just before the election of 2000. Even then, it was so bad that a then-Congressman from southern Illinois came up to the Gallery to talk with the few of us who were sitting there, to apologize for the behavior of his colleagues below. He was leaving the Congress he said. He just couldn’t take it any more.
That was 16 years ago. It has only gotten much worse, since.
I am mostly around people who would be characterized as “left” wing, though I’m on the very moderate side. I can’t recall ever running into someone as bizarre as “John” has turned out to be. He’s the “canary” in the contemporary Republican coal mine.
If you’re Republican, and want to clean up the party, oddly, you need to consider strongly not voting Republican for any office this time around.
And I say this as a strong believer in the two-party system.