GOP debates show the worst

How scary were the most recent Republican debates? Fifteen candidates, each one’s positions more frightening than the next. One candidate believes vaccines cause autism, another doesn’t believe in evolution, and another believes the Dred Scott Decision is still the law of the land. How many of them believe that President Barack Obama is foreign-born or is Muslim? (Not that there would be anything wrong with that.)

There was a time when Ronald Reagan and George Bush, both H.W. and W., were considered conservatives by Republicans. But Reagan gave amnesty to millions of undocumented immigrants; Bush 41 said “no new taxes” but once elected did “yes new taxes”; and Bush 43 expanded Medicare. Reagan, Bush and Bush were all solid conservatives, but some of their positions would not be tolerated by those 15 candidates. Today, these three Republican presidents would probably be attacked as leftists. 

The Democratic Party today consists of centrists, liberals and progressives. The Republican Party today has a far right and a very far right. They spent three long hours at these debates trash talking the United States, talking about who can build the biggest and longest wall on our southern border, trying to prove they have the most aggressive position on Iran, and explaining how they would further skew the tax system even more in favor of the rich. One of them even suggested that ultra-conservative Chief Justice of the Supreme Court John Roberts wasn’t conservative enough and should not have been appointed. I did not hear any proposals to address the truly crucial issues of our time: poverty, our broken education system and fighting global warming (which many of them don’t believe exists). 

Every four years I think the Republican candidate is too conservative, but in recent years they’ve gotten worse. Republican leaders have openly hated Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama for so many years; they are now willing to say anything. They seem to forget that this president saved our country from a Bush-caused second Great Depression. While Mr. Bush’s war in Iraq was based on a lie and was paid for with borrowed money, it was President Obama who was responsible for killing Osama bin Laden. President Obama significantly cut the deficit, created millions of new jobs, cut unemployment in half, and gave health care coverage to millions. If you were to listen to the Doom and Gloom Fifteen you would think the USA is on the verge of collapse.  Instead of constant, irrational attacks on Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, maybe they should say, “Thank you for saving our country from the disastrous Republican policies that threatened to wreck our great nation.”