To the Editor:

Maybe I should have remained a Republican; maybe I should have worked with others, from within, to try and restore the party, to try and steer it back to the noble principles I and my parents and grandparents once felt represented the best of America.

Maybe we could have dissuaded our elected representatives from wallowing in obstinacy for the sake of obstinacy, from engaging in ridicule, name-calling and innuendo.

Maybe we could have saved them, the party – and me – from embarrassment. Maybe I could have helped. But I didn’t.

Eight years ago, when Mitch McConnell said the Republican party he led had nothing more important to do than to see that Obama did not get re-elected, he took the wind from my GOP sails and for a while, for a few years, I tried to convince myself that that really stupid declaration, flying in the face of so many realities, so much that really did need our deliberative attention, was an anomaly.

But, before long, it became apparent I was wrong. That was, in fact, what he meant: that we had nothing more important to do. And then Trump was elected and they, our elected representatives, began falling dutifully in line and confirming that, in fact, they had and have nothing more important to do than to maintain that obstinacy.

And now, after a transparent election, that line-up of sycophants, in the interest of securing re-election above all else has demonstrated a willingness to sink to whatever depths are necessary to secure the allegiance of an obviously criminal former president, his presumed base of supporters, many of whom have fallen victim to such astonishing delusions as organized pedophilia among the opposition and critical race theory –  as if instruction about the absolute truth of America’s history, its successes, and failures, ought to be ignored.

I keep thinking ‘this is the final straw’ but the behavior of certain Republican Senators at this week’s Judiciary Committee’s hearings so clearly had nothing to do with Judge Jackson’s qualifications and everything to do with winning the allegiance of Trump’s diminishing army of disciples and their own political survival was the last straw.

I feel better about myself, having made the right decision in leaving the party. I am truly ashamed, as an American, of their behavior. If I were still a Republican, I’d certainly feel even worse.

Phil Crossman

Vinalhaven