The great harm some politicians do
Last Sunday, the state’s 14th District congressman, Guy Reschenthaler, emailed a request for money to fight the “liberal … socialist” agenda of the Democrats.
Now, when the Republican Reschenthaler was running for the job against the Democrat Bibi Boerio last fall, he was mostly sweetness and light. He pledged to “reach across the aisle”, to work with Democrats, to be a nose-to-the-grindstone legislator, more concerned with solving problems than with scoring political points.
His backers all said so: here was a guy who would work with members of the opposition to bring commonsense, bipartisan decision-making to the halls of Congress.
Reschenthaler portrayed himself as the anti-Rick Saccone. Remember him? Saccone was the Republican candidate for Congress who billed himself as Trump “before there was Trump.”
Reschenthaler, running in a primary election against Saccone and in the general against Boerio, paid sufficient attention to GOP orthodoxy to keep the ultra partisans at bay. But his overarching message was: I’ll be reasonable, I’ll work with Democrats and Republicans to make the wheels of government work like they should, like they were intended.
Reschenthaler was joshing, or worse. There’s no other way to reconcile what he’s saying now with what he said back in the tell-them-anything days of the campaign.
Addressing himself to “Team Guy”, the congressman, in his email, assured would-be funders that he was “on the front lines fighting for our Southwestern Pennsylvania conservative values.”
Not only was he siding with President Trump, but the first-year congressman was battling the “radical agenda of liberal Democrat Socialists.”
Reschenthaler continued: “I’m fighting against Democrat Socialists’ extreme open border policies.
“I’m fighting against the Democrat Socialists’ unthinkable demands for infanticide …
“I’m fight against Democrat Socialists’ radical and ridiculous Green New Deal.
He reminded his “team” that there was no collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians in 2016. He concluded by saying, in all caps, “LIBERALS WILL STOP AT NOTHING TO STEAL ELECTIONS.”
There you have it – moderation, conciliation, the spirit of working together manifesting itself in the words of a wise, courageous congressional leader – a man whose very thoughts are so soaring they might someday be chiseled in granite.
Now I’m joshing. Actually, Reschenthaler resembles Henry Adams’ description of members of Congress in the late 19th century, when lawmakers were on the auction block to the high rollers of the day.
Adams called Washington, D.C., a “wilderness of stunted natures where no straight road was to be found, but only the torturous and aimless tracks of wild beasts and things that crawl.”
Slithering along in the muck and the mud, Reschenthaler has only to remain in Washington a while longer and he’ll be a fine example of reptilian excess. Not much good at human problem-solving, mind you, but with enough cold blood coursing through his veins to perform any partisan hatchet job with the greatest of ease.
But is that the sort we really want directing the nation’s fortunes?
Of course lawmakers are not angels. The Founders wrote into the Constitution checks and balances to guard the nation against political perfidy. But no number of constitutional constraints can guard against the election of the willfully shortsighted.
You see, democracy, if it’s to work, requires forbearance. It requires a certain humility, admittedly a steep climb for the super egos who normally make it to Washington. At a minimum, it requires a certain collegiality. There is political grandstanding and partisan sniping, on one hand; and all out political warfare, on the other. True, it’s sometimes hard to tell the difference, but there is a difference.
Washington is fractured because of people like Guy Reschenthaler. Legislative politics should be about the art of the possible, but how do you strike bargains with people who are your moral inferiors? How do you compromise with people who don’t share your “values?”
The country is in an awful shape. Loose, careless talk in pursuit of political money pits lawmakers scripted by their party’s fundraising hierarchy against those who are not members of the “team.”
Rabid partisans in and around Congress as killing us. Capitol Hill ideologs are killing us. Men and women with “values” standing on the frontlines of national politics are killing us. Small cogs though they are, blind partisans and party stooges like Guy Reschenthaler are killing us.
Stop killing us. Do something to help.
Richard Robbins lives in Uniontown. He can be reached at dick.l.robbins@gmail.com.