By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com
I must admit to a certain level of naivete.
My hope had been that with the election of Joe Biden as president of the United States that the nation would see a fairly rapid restoration of good manners among members of Congress and congressional interaction with the White House.
President Biden built a lengthy Senate career marked by the former senator’s long-standing and nearly legendary ability to work with Republicans. He calls himself a “proud Democrat” but he managed to forge friendships with colleagues from the other side of the room.
He served 36 years in the Senate before becoming vice president in the Obama administration. He worked hand-in-glove with GOP senators.
Then he ran for president against Donald Trump, whose term as president was marked by constant battles with Democrats. He took a lot of Republican members of Congress along with him in those fights.
What I never quite banked on was that the animosity would outlive Donald Trump’s departure from the White House. I am saddened to realize that the residue of that anger and animosity has infected many GOP House members and senators, even as the nation has sought to recover from the tempest, tumult and turmoil of the Trump years.
The nation’s divisions run deep. I am not going to concede that the divisions are deepening at this moment. I will cling to the belief that they have reached rock bottom. Until we are able to bind up those wounds, I fear that President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris are in for a long slog through the morass.
I heard today that Merrick Garland, the president’s nominee to be attorney general, can’t get a hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee to consider his confirmation. The current chair, Republican Lindsey Graham, won’t schedule a hearing.
There’s good news, though, on the horizon. Graham will hand the chairman’s gavel over to Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy soon and Leahy then will get the hearing scheduled.
What is remarkable about Graham’s intransigence is that he once described Joe Biden as one of “the finest men God ever created.” The men’s friendship was long thought to be a model of bipartisan chumminess. Then Graham slipped into Donald Trump’s hip pocket and that all changed.
I use that example to illustrate the anger that continues to infect the governance of this country.
The lingering anger likely will be one of the many distasteful legacies that Donald Trump leaves behind.