AN OPEN LETTER TO CONGRESSIONAL REPUBLICANS

In the wake of the open letter that Senate Republicans wrote to the Iranian government, I have decided to respond personally, not on behalf of Iran, but on behalf of America.

Dear Republican Members of the United States House and Senate:

I’m not going to get specific here because it isn’t worth my time to list every single area in which you have repeatedly failed America over the last six years, but suffice it to say, fail is what you have done, and with potentially disastrous consequences for our nation.

Since day one of Obama’s presidency, you have tapped into the worst of what people can be. Your “leader” Mitch McConnell made it clear that your #1 priority was to ensure Obama was a one term president, and when President Obama tried to engage in bipartisan negotiations over Obamacare, Senator McConnell rallied the troops to ensure that the fight over healthcare would be “Obama’s Waterloo.”

What followed has been one of the ugliest non-violent displays of bigotry imaginable. You accused the man of being a Muslim, a Kenyan, a socialist, all without even attempting to work with him, but while using your energies on a forlorn quest to find his birth certificate. As you continued to peddle fear and snake oil to the American people, you yourselves became its primary consumers. You drank in your own poisonous lies with such horrific intentionality that you became blind to truth, reason, and facts. Perhaps for a few of you it is not too late to see the light, but for many, these lies have seeped deep into your psyche. This country was and still is on its way towards moving passed the ugly strains of our past, but you unleashed a new wave of racial and ideological fear that has set our country back.

As you became more ensconced in your echo chamber of fear, lies, and stupidity, you doubled down on them. Anything the president proposed was wrong, and your only talking point became “Obama sucks.” This resonated with a small but vocal percentage of the population, but has fallen short with almost all reasonable and rational adults. If the president said X, your response was Y.

As a result of this vapid display of bigotry, you spawned a new movement which you are still unable to control, the Tea Party, a group of individuals who pretend to care about fiscal prudence while walking around in the attire of the 18th century. You became consumed by this group, and nurtured it to your own detriment.

But your opposition, while perhaps — but debatably — effective in the short term, will have serious long-term consequences for the political party that you have placed on a pedestal much higher than the one you reserve for the American people. You see, while you’ve spent the last six years telling us about how horrible the president is, the world and our country have and continue to face myriad problems. You have failed to address a single one of them.

Consumed by hatred, you have focused all your time and energy fostering fear. Your pitiful attempts at governance have resulted in not a single forward-looking idea to improve the quality of life for most Americans or to address the problems of a complex world. Your attitude towards Obamacare reflect your fear that the program will work rather than your sincere belief that it won’t, and while you’ve voted to repeal that law copious and uncountable times, you’ve offered no solutions for how to address the disaster that was US healthcare prior to the ACA.

Similarly, and more recently, with Iran, you have undermined the president’s attempts to make a deal with that nation regarding its nuclear program. You don’t like the deal; fair enough. May I suggest you offer an alternative? May I suggest you have an idea, a single idea, JUST ONE IDEA for how to address any of this great country’s needs? You bring in the prime minister of Israel to address what he sees as an existential threat to his country, but as to the existential threat the entire world faces — climate change and global warming — your response is to hold up a snowball as some sort of evidence that this threat is false, evidence a third grader understands is not actually evidence.

Let me be as clear as I possibly can here. I hope it pains you to know that the world you are fighting to preserve will not last. The barriers to progress that you have wantonly thrown up over the last six years will be overcome by the MANY Americans who strive tirelessly to make the world better. Fortunately for you, your legacy won’t be bad, it simply won’t exist. We will leave your hatred and your lack of ideas in the wake of progress, and all that you have spent your time working towards will crumble as a better world emerges. The people changing our planet for the better are those looking for and trying new things, offering suggestions and ideas, fighting to make things better. You have spent six years doing the exact opposite.

The American people deserve better than what you have offered. And to make this hit home just a little bit more, allow me to share a bit about my background. I am a 29-year-old, upper-middle class, heterosexual white male from the state of Mississippi. If I’m not with you…well, you’re screwed.

My sincere hope is that enough of you still have it within you to find sanity, embrace facts, and offer positive ideas for how to make our nation better. I’m not holding my breath.

-Will Staton

#DomesticAffairs