‘The Squad’ represents part of America

Posted 7/30/19

Dear Editor:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi made a common lay-person’s error the other day, equating correlation with causation in regards to the president’s Twitter attack on four …

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‘The Squad’ represents part of America

Posted

Dear Editor:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi made a common lay-person’s error the other day, equating correlation with causation in regards to the president’s Twitter attack on four female U.S. House representatives of color collectively known as “The Squad.” Despite his lifelong history of behavior and discourse indicating racism, we will never know objectively whether this was his motivation until such time as something like a “bigot-meter” gets invented.

Nevertheless, when our own representative in the House Liz Cheney defends him, attacking her colleagues using phrases like “… they don’t represent American values,” she needs to be reminded in no uncertain terms that, in fact, they do represent the values of at least a portion of America. They are, after all, duly-elected representatives in our government just as she and the current occupant of the White House are. Further, both Ms. Cheney and the president need to keep in mind that one American value, enshrined in the First Amendment to our Constitution, is the right to criticize the government. Another, the right to choose our government using free and fair elections, put these women in the positions they now hold.

I’m proud of the bravery of these women in challenging what I consider to be gross misuse of power and abuse of office, in the face of great opposition up to and including death threats. It is my First Amendment right to express myself about this. The fact that I feel compelled to write for the second time in a week about current, former and potential future Wyoming legislators claiming to be supporters of the First Amendment while attacking practitioners of that amendment and defending a president whose assault on First Amendment rights started even before he was elected should be disturbing to all of us.

Phil Anthony

Powell

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