26 May,
2017
Rep. Dana
Rohrabacher,
101 Main
Street #380
Huntington
Beach, CA 92648
Dear
Congressman,
Re: Your
new colleague
I see you
have a new colleague in the US House of Representatives, Greg Gianforte of
Montana. Despite his display of unprovoked violence the night before the
election, the people of his state re-elected him to this high office.
I’m left
wondering if the result would have been the same had the incident occurred a day
earlier? What do you think? Would the Montana Republican electorate have been
swayed by their candidate’s physical attack on a journalist who was doing no
more than his job, in asking questions? Have we become so inured to the public
display of this kind of belligerence that we shrug it off as unimportant, even
acceptable? It was a frequent—and apparently popular—part of your president’s*
2016 campaign, and one that was explicitly encouraged by the candidate, who now
struts the world stage, his bullying on global display.
What is
the world to think of us? Fair or not, there was always the impression, as I
was growing up in Europe, that Americans were too big for their boots; that
these New Worlders, these conquerors, lacked the courtesy, the manners and
cultural sophistication of the countries they swept through in the Second World
War. That impression now risks being confirmed by the image Trump projects: the
rude, self-important, opinionated boor who cares for nothing other than
himself, his money, and his power.
I am sad
for America. I am sad for myself, as a relatively new American, who chose this
country for all the wonderful qualities now obscured by this president* with
his relatively small band of supporters and his Republican enablers. America,
it has often been said, is better than this. Or should be.
Regretfully,
Peter
Clothier, Ph.D.
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