An unbelievably easy answer

You may recall that back in December the head of the current Republican administration tweeted his desire to jumpstart the nuclear arms race, because that makes sense.[1]

Now it is being reported that he and his boyfriend Vlad were talking the other weekend, and the leader of the free world confessed that it seemed to him that neither country had enough nuclear warheads and that Obama was a poopyhead for negotiating the most recent START agreements limiting the two countries.  Not banning nuclear weapons, minds you, just limiting, but even that chafes the Leader’s butt.

Sweet baby Cthulhu, how small are the man’s hands??

Off we go to our senators, who would be in charge of any treaties, etc.

On Dec 24, 2016, I emailed you to ask if you agreed with the president’s tweet that we should restart the nuclear arms race.  You haven’t answered.

Now it appears that the president, in a private talk with Putin, has denigrated the limitations of the most recent START agreement.

If this proves to be the case, will you support a nuclear arms race?  If so, to what end?

I do not expect an answer.

—————
[1] It does not make sense, not strategically, not tactically, not militarily, not ethically, not even economically.

Not so simple question

Since the Congress is determined to throw healthcare in the country into a death spiral, I thought it would be worth asking:

What is your plan to protect the gains we have made in providing health coverage to our citizens?

I of course do not expect a response.  These people do not actually care what their constituents think.

Not so easy question, The Wall edition

I for one am not even astonished that the Congress is looking to fund the president-elect’s “wall.”  So what if the man said that “Mexico will pay for it”?  Apparently nothing he said on the campaign trail matters.[1]

It also doesn’t seem to matter that the party of “fiscal responsibility” and “small government” now wants to jumpstart the biggest boondoggle since the Iraq war.

But I do have some questions for my elected representatives.

  • Does the congressman have data (in the form of research studies or reports) on the effectiveness of a “wall” in keeping migrant workers from entering the country from Mexico?  Can you provide me with a link to any of those?
  • Does the congressman have data (in the form of research studies or reports) on the impact on employment/wages in this country if low-wage migrant workers are excluded from the economy?  What are his plans to prevent wage inflation if the country loses access to these workers?
  • Has the congressman weighed the opportunity costs between building the “wall” and investing in the country’s infrastructure?  In other words, given our limited resources, is it going to be a better strategy to insure our economic future to build the wall rather than to repair our bridges, roads, and airports?

Or, bluntly, is the congressman’s vote based purely on the symbolic vindictiveness that seems to characterize his party?

—————

[1] It doesn’t matter because the only thing that matters to the Republicker party is that they now have a patsy in the White House.

Holy crap.

I don’t even really know how to phrase this in the form of a question.

The president-elect tweeted this morning:

“Happy New Year to all, including to my many enemies and those who have fought me and lost so badly they just don’t know what to do. Love!”

What are your thoughts about this man’s message?  Do you think this is appropriate for our nation’s leader?  Do you support this attitude?

Given that I have not had an answer to most of my easy questions, I don’t expect to hear from either of my senators on this one either.  (Still waiting for my new representative to emerge from his pod.)

Another easy question

The precedent-elect [sic] has been tweeting again, so again I turn to my elected officials to see if they agree with him.

The president-elect has tweeted that the U.S. must “greatly strengthen and expand its nuclear capability until such time as the world comes to its senses regarding nukes.”

Do you agree that our nation should spend its resources on re-triggering the nuclear arms race?

Easy answer, one might think

So Newt Gingrich, who started our nation’s slide into hyperpartisanship and truthiness, was interviewed on NPR on Monday, and essentially he put it out there for normalization: the president-elect is so rich, so incredibly rich, such an unbelievably successful businessman, that we should not expect him to have to follow our federal ethics laws.

::sigh::

Off to the representatives we go:

On Monday, Newt Gingrich said that the president-elect can’t be expected to follow current ethics rules.

Do you agree that the president-elect should be allowed to ignore federal ethics rules?

And again we wait.

You know…

…I think my elected officials are just trolling me.

Here’s Senator Johnny Isakson’s email:

Thank you for contacting my office regarding federal policy. I appreciate your thoughts and the opportunity to respond.

As a member of the United States Senate, I am pleased to see constituents, such as you, taking the time to share your thoughts and concerns about the federal government and its policies. Your letter will be helpful to me as the Senate considers legislation dealing with the issues facing our great nation.

Thank you again for contacting me, and I hope you will not hesitate to call on me in the future if I can be of assistance to you.

Again, not only is this not an answer to any question I’ve asked, I can’t even tell which question it’s in response to.

Putz.

A REALLY easy answer

I got this email from Senator David Perdue yesterday:

Thank you for contacting me with your concerns regarding the 2016 Presidential Election.  I always appreciate the opportunity to hear from my fellow Georgians.

The American people sent a strong message in November about the kind of leadership our country needs. Voters are tired of constant gridlock and lack of results from career politicians and have given a successful businessman, Donald Trump, an opportunity to bring some common sense to Washington. Our nation faces a skyrocketing federal debt, stagnant economy, and global security crisis, and I look forward to working with President-Elect Trump to tackle these issues.

Again, thank you for taking the time to contact me about these issues as your thoughts are important to me.

Blah blah blah.

Not only is this not an answer to any question I have sent to Sen. Perdue, I can’t even tell which question it’s not an answer to.

This is the quintessence of non-responsive government.