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Chester County Press

Why did Pitts and Tea Party Republicans really shut down the government?

11/13/2013 02:45PM ● By Acl

Letter to the Editor:

The recent shutdown of the federal government was the result of our Congressman, Joe Pitts, along with a small group of Tea Party Republicans, deciding to circumvent the Affordable Care Act, which is the law of the land.

If you or I attempt to circumvent the law we would be known as "criminals." They decided to circumvent this law by shutting down the government, essentially taking the entire nation hostage.

If you or I took hostages we would be called "terrorists." In order to accomplish this task, they chose to break the rules of government and congress to withhold funding.

If you or I broke the rules of our society we would be called "sociopaths." In doing so, they closed all federal offices, parks and websites, putting hundreds of thousands of people out of work and driving the nation almost to the point of bankruptcy and the world to the brink of economic collapse and exposing us to attack from our enemies.

If you or I tried to harm the nation we would again be called "traitors." Both during and after the shutdown, this group tries to place the blame for their actions on just about everybody else on the planet.

If you or I did that we would be called "liars."

Why did Joe Pitts and this small group commit this heinous act? They say that it was to protect us from the Affordable Care Act, which provides a mechanism for all Americans to have health insurance at a reasonable price with nobody being denied coverage. Now we know that Joe Pitts and his Tea Party buddies aren't opposed to health insurance, because they all have excellent coverage paid for by you and I. So this begs the question, why did they really do this? Do they simply not want us to have health insurance? Would they rather see the average American bankrupted at the first sign of any mildly serious health problem? Or do they simply hate the president so much that they would do anything to stop him?

Again, if you or I tried this we would be called "traitors."

The cost of this shutdown to us was $24 billion, enough to fund school lunches nationwide for two and a half years, Pell Grants for over a year or to rebuild 20 percent of our ailing interstate highway system. This is nothing more than robbery of the American people by a small band of rogue congressmen. Mr. Pitts, the only course of action is for you to apologize, resign and pay us back the $24 billion.

 

 

Stacey Salamon

Avondale, Pa.