I Should Have Stayed Home

I Should Have Stayed Home

By

Leonard Zwelling

Contrary to what my conservative friends believe, I was a reluctant voter for Joe Biden in 2020. I thought he was too old, no longer sharp, and offered no new ideas for the challenges facing the country. What I did not foresee was how damaging a Biden Presidency was going to be. Now, I am afraid, I do. Given who he ran against, my only choice in 2020 should have been to stay home or simply not vote for President. Now it appears, the irreparable and inevitable has unfolded. This should give those conservative friends a great deal to gloat about, but I could not vote for a man as ethically compromised as Donald Trump and I should not have voted for one as arrogant and stubborn as Joe Biden.

As this editorial from The New York Times on September 1 reveals, Biden’s Afghanistan policy has become a living hell for the many Afghans who aided the Americans over the twenty-year occupation. But what is worse, Mr. Biden has managed to lower the respect the rest of the world has for America by the manner in which he left Afghanistan. In no way can the pullout be interpreted as anything but capitulation to the very evil we went to Afghanistan to end in 2001. It is simply unacceptable for us to enter a country, mess around for a while, and then leave when the going gets tough and desert those who aided in our war efforts.

Was all of this Mr. Biden’s fault? By no means, but Presidents inherit the disasters of their predecessors and such was the case for Mr. Obama and Mr. Trump as well. This was George W. Bush’s doing, but the fact is the original mission was a success. It defeated the Taliban. We just had no plan for afterwards and instead diverted our attention to a truly unnecessary war in Iraq which is also ending in disaster as that country is destabilized along with the rest of the Middle East thanks to the American intervention.

In Mr. Biden’s running from Afghanistan without informing our NATO allies and the destruction and death that has already ensued and the additional chaos sure to follow in that country, I simply cannot support this President any longer. He has undermined America’s standing in the world just to extract us from a series of foolish decisions with no plan to do so safely and in an organized manner. I kept hoping he would start to make some sense, but I am afraid that is unlikely. Further, I cannot sanction his resignation as his Vice President is simply too inexperienced to take over.

It’s about now that my conservative friends say I should have voted for The Donald. Let’s be clear. Donald Trump tried to overthrow the Constitutional order of the country and is still trying to do so. We just had a horrible choice in 2020 and for that we can thank timid Republicans and left-wing Democrats.

I see little alternative to throwing them all out of office and starting again using the means given us in the Constitution. Vote them all out. I may just vote for any non-incumbent next time. Congress is dysfunctional and the Executive branch incompetent. The Judiciary branch is keeping us afloat, but barely.

The American government is sorely in need of major repair. That is fine. We have the mechanisms to make that repair peaceably. Let’s commit now to new leadership in 2024. Neither Biden nor Trump should run. We need a fresh start and then we need to mend fences with our allies because the world still needs America unless you believe Chinese rule for the globe is acceptable. I don’t.