Dear Mr. Lincoln,
Your political party, the now called Grand Old Party, the one founded to oppose the spreading of slavery and the 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act, would be unrecognizable to you today if you were to return from the grave. It is no longer the party bent on such liberal ideal as the pursuit of happiness and the principle that all men and women are created equal. The GOP, Mr. Lincoln, has done a one-eighty and is sadly now siding with white supremacists, with Qanons, and with other nefarious throngs. The party also condones liars.
Take the case of J.R. Majewski, for example, a Republican running for a northwestern Ohio congressional seat. He claims to be an Air Force combat veteran and that he deployed to Afghanistan. But he didn’t. According to an Associated Press story, Mr. Majewski’s combat claim is suspect, adding that his post-military personal bio “has been defined by exaggerations, conspiracy theories, talk of violent action against the U.S. government and occasional financial duress.”
Here’s an example of another GOP liar that is also running for office: Herschel Walker, a once gloried man of professional football and Heisman Trophy fame. He’s the Republican candidate for Senate in Georgia. His habit for lying goes back a while, Mr. Lincoln. At one point he falsely claimed that he had graduated at the top one percent of his class at the University of Georgia, when in fact he never even graduated. A couple of years ago, he claimed that his food distribution company employed around 800 people, though he only listed eight employees on an SBA application that same year to get a PPP loan. He’s also claimed that his company has donated fifteen percent of its profits to different charities, but there’s no evidence of that, according to several sources. Herschel Walker also has a history of violent behavior in past relationships, which he blames on mental illness. What a bum.
And here’s the biggest Republican liar of them all: Donald Trump. Bending the truth is his game; all-out lying and pandering to the ugly faction in America feed his fame. Trump has taken the GOP hostage, Mr. Lincoln. He’s got a chokehold on the Grand Old Party as we speak, and he’s getting others to mimic his bad behavior and his odious ways. He’s killing your once illustrious political party, Mr. Lincoln.
Fortunately, for we the people, Trump’s time of reckoning has already arrived, and he’ll soon pay the price for some of the wrongs he’s done. Unfortunately, because of the copycats he has spawned, our nation and our values are currently being destroyed by myriad Trump clones. That cadre of liars and bums, Mr. Lincoln, that fear mongering horde, is wrecking America.
But based on our past history and our indomitable ways, I firmly believe that our form of government will not perish. It will survive and it will become stronger once it shakes off the current and deceitful onslaught of hatred and division being propagated by misguided Republican zealots. The grand party of yore, however, might not be that fortunate. The way I see it, the GOP, just like Trump the circus ringmaster, is about to have its own time of reckoning. It won’t be pretty for your party, Mr. Lincoln. It’s done the wrong and it will pay.
AUTHOR: Pedro Chávez