Doris Smith’s letter “Politics as Usual” (Aug. 5) was right on the money. The Republicans she cites voted to increase the debt ceiling on many occasions during the Bush administration. She’s also correct that the newly installed Republican Congress let the budget and debt ceiling debate ride until the 11th hour. If it weren’t for one glaring omission, I’d have thought this article was written by a tea party sympathizer.

Smith may or may not have purposefully omitted that the Democratic-led Congress under President Obama failed to pass a budget at all (which would have included a vote on the debt ceiling) in almost two years. That’s a pretty big oops.

The interesting thing is that the run-of-the-mill tea partier would agree with her that Democrats, as well as Republicans, have gotten us into this debt mess. They would also agree that everyone should pay their fair share of taxes.

Unfortunately, in this regard, the Democrats’ definition of fair can’t be found in any dictionary. The typical tea partier would also agree to remove loopholes in the tax code. They would probably go even further and say, “Throw it away and start over.” Start over with a flat or national sales tax, which would ensure fairness as easily defined by Google.

So basically Smith is right on the money but left on the reason. The reason there has been any real discussion at all about the future viability of this great nation is because of tea party members in Congress taking action against the same old Washington politics.

Kevin Graham

Aberdeen