Respect the office

This is simply not the case with regard to our federal debt situation or our economic situation at the time that President Obama took office, and it does not hold now. The long-term effects of 30 years of government deregulation of economic markets; privatization of public services; de-investment in our nation’s infrastructure; easing of tax burdens upon the wealthiest 1 percent of the population, and the maintenance of a constant state of war in this country (standing professional armies, conflicts and associated costs) have had, and will continue to have, long-term effects that no single president — of whatever party affiliation — will be able to adequately address.

I’ll ignore the rest of Brooks’ polemic, since they are essentially ad hominem arguments with no factual validity.

Whether you agree with his policies or oppose them, President Obama is, at least until next January, the president of the U.S. You do not have to respect the man, but you must respect the office.

Throwing around straw-man arguments and ad hominem attacks as a cover for disrespecting the office is itself disrespectful, and is all too easily seen in these days of “Murdochracy,” in which “crackpot history and the right to lie,” as Adam Ant called it, takes the place of actual civil discourse in the public sphere.

—Glen Garcia, Edmond

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