This is Memorial Day weekend. We honor those who fought to protect our democracy; those who gave their lives on battlefields such as Gettysburg and Antietam where traitors trying to destroy our Union were beaten back. We honor men who died at horrific places like the lonely jungles of the Solomon Islands and on the beaches of Tarawa, Omaha Beach, and Gela and others who froze at the Chosin Reservoir, Korea. We remember those who fell from the sky over Germany and Japan during the Second World War.
And we remember the Capitol police officers that valiantly held back the insurrectionists of January 6, 2021, fringe reactionaries who wanted – and still want to -- do the same thing that the Nazis, the fascists and Soviet communists wanted to do to American democracy.
Today Senate Republicans – except for six honorable exceptions – betrayed the sacrifices of all those that risked everything to preserve our form of self-government. These GOP senators even ignored the pleas of the mother of a deceased police officer who may have lost his life because of insurrectionist violence. By voting against the January 6th Bipartisan Commission. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and most of his Republican colleagues should now be considered modern day Benedict Arnolds. These are people who put partisan politics ahead of country.
The Senate Minority Leader and his GOP senators are riding a tiger. The last time this happened was in 1931 Germany when Conservative politicians believed they could ride Hitler’s following to power and then tame the Nazi leader. As that turned out badly, so would this strategy. Senator McConnell does not understand that when you attempt to ride a tiger, the tiger eventually devours you.
