Letters to the Editor: How the Democrats can take control by helping Kevin McCarthy

To the editor: As I write this, who is the second in line to the U.S. presidency? That would be Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), the Senate president pro tempore and the first woman in that position. (“Kevin McCarthy falls short on first three votes for speaker in historic defeat,” Jan. 3)

Why don’t the Democrats just leave the House floor and let the Republicans elect Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Bakersfield) as speaker? They should tell him that they are interested in working with him on legislative compromise, and if he fails to work cooperatively, they will vote to “vacate” the office of speaker and let Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) push him around some more.

I know, why stop the Republicans while they are humiliating themselves? McCarthy probably can’t handle anything but an investigation of Hunter Biden, but I am just saying — give this a try.

Paul Lippe, Santa Monica

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To the editor: My profound thanks to the Republican Party of 2016 for giving us Donald Trump, and to the Republican Party of the years that have followed for giving us the current House of Representatives.

Right now, Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Bakersfield) fights for his entitlement to the House speakership while the MAGA crowd fights to save us from pedophiles in pizza parlors, immigrants who are stealing our jobs and people who fear that carrying guns into bars could be dangerous.

Where are the “responsible Republicans” who might be expected to speak of infant mortality and access to healthcare, rebuilding of our public education systems or anything that might be constructive? They are, as usual, functioning as weather vanes, serving only to gauge the direction of the prevailing wind.

Elliott Rothman, Santa Monica