To the Eagle:

It appears that some of our local citizenry have chosen a winter exercise program of jumping up and down on the ol’ Trump-o-line (last week’s letters to The Eagle). Great sport, but many criticisms are in the category of missing the mark, or beside the point, or, as a youngster might say, clueless. Yes, Trump got elected with less than a majority of the popular vote. That’s happened 20 times since the founding, five times when only two candidates were running, and proves the efficacy of the electoral college system. Get used to it.

His “base” was the “forgotten man” (similar to Nixon’s “silent majority”), a group interested in employment and a healthy economy. Unemployment’s way down and the stock market’s way up, so it looks as if they chose well. He also pledged to undo the mess Obama made, but he’s trying to do it with legislation, rather than imperial edict as Obama did. Failure to repeal and replace Obamacare must be blamed on congress, not Trump. A pretty good tax reform is halfway through congress and includes repeal of the individual mandate, one of the most onerous provisions of Obamacare. His action on immigration has emphasized compliance with existing law, and he has a good compromise before congress on the “dreamers” (kids brought in illegally).

Most of us consider appointing secretaries who seem to want to shut down their own agencies to be a good thing – part of “draining the swamp” – as well as curtailing some of the most destructive activities of the Dept of Education and the EPA. And what the “pathetic Roy Moore situation” shows is the willingness of the GOP to ditch a candidate in the face of unsubstantiated allegations of sexual misconduct while the Dems retain Al Franken despite proven (by photo and admission) charges of sexual assault. And our intelligence agencies may indeed deserve a tad of criticism. Trump just secured the release of 470,000 files from Osama bin Laden’s compound that reveal how badly Obama misled us about Iran, Iraq, and Al Qaeda.

No argument here with the idea of finding more viable candidates, but there wasn’t much wrong with the array of talent the GOP lined up that Trump beat because he alone identified the “hot-button issues.” And look at the dazzling array the Dems came up with: Hillary, the betrayer of Benghazi, and now, it appears, uranium thief; Bernie, a tired old socialist; John Kerry whose political malfeasance armed Iran with both nukes and money; Al Gore the global warming flim-flam man, and Bill Clinton who’s spent four decades cheating at everything from sex to golf. Colin Powell’s comment about a “national disgrace” (from a hacked personal email) seems a bit misplaced. The Donald may have disgraced himself a bit, but it’s the clowns listed above who have disgraced our nation.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Howard Brawn

Puget Island