Senator Melendez, Please Quit

The following is a letter I am sending to Sen. Menendez:

Dear Sen. Menendez:

Please resign.

I am sure that this is not the only letter or email or phone call that you are receiving from constituents like me who are asking you do the same thing. I urgently add this to your pile. 

Doesn’t this beseeching chorus tell you anything? It comes not from your fellow politicians. Those must be viewed through a practical lens. The Republicans who want you out are just taking the opportunity to, for once, point to a Democrat who’s a crook. The Democrats who are calling for your resignation are only doing that because they know their fellow Democrat, Governor Murphy, will name another Democrat to fill in. It’s easy to recall that there weren’t many Democrats calling for your demise.

We constituents point to four basic reasons why you should turn in your Senate ID tomorrow – (1) Small “d” democratic; (2) Political; (3) Practical; and (4) Moral.

When I say “Small ‘d’ democratic” I mean the obvious – we are your bosses. We are the voters who put you there. We are the ones who gave you the job so it’s only logical that we are then the ones who can tell you to leave it. 

We’re telling you. LEAVE!

Secondly, these are the political reasons. You have set before the Republicans a feast of “what-about-ism” that they will devour and spit back at us as a defense for their felon-in-chief. Can’t you hear them? “Say what you want about Trump,” they will say, but at least Trump never took any gold bars (ha, ha, ha).” This, sir, we do not need. We are now confronting a force that wants to undermine fundamental American principles like truth and freedom. And that force is winning. And that force is being led by an outlaw. We cannot afford to give that crowd the ability to point it’s crooked fingers at an outlaw of our own. 

You are that outlaw. LEAVE!

The third reason is simply practical. You insist on “representing the people of New Jersey.” Bullshit. You can’t do anything of any consequence in government anymore. You are damaged goods. You have no influence. Who among the public is going to listen to you when you put that puss of yours in front of a camera and spout out some policy point? I’ll tell you who’ll listen – nobody. Once people realize that it’s you, they’ll think, “Menendez? Menendez? Oh, yeah, he’s the guy who stuffed half a million in cash in his suit jackets. And I’m supposed to listen to him?” Your colleagues in the Senate will give you even less attention. Try to ask one of them to join you for dinner. They’d rather be seen in public with O.J. 

Thanks for your service, Bob. LEAVE!

Finally, and, in the end most importantly, there are the moral reasons. Not like it ever mattered to you, but people like you who place themselves before the public and who ask for our approval bring upon themselves the duty to be a moral example for that same public. You can call this just an old, corny outdated idea, and maybe it is. But sometimes old and corny and outdated ideas are pretty good. This one is. Don’t you see the lines of students who parade through the Capitol every day? Don’t you see the wonder in their faces as for the first time they sense the power that the people in that building wield. Don’t you want them to emerge from their tour thinking that those people are honest and decent? That they are wielding that power in the right way? Don’t you want to leave those kids with a reason to rethink the pessimism and cynicism that permeates their world? Well, you ain’t doin’ that, Bob. All you’re doing is teaching those impressionable teens that the criminal among us (like you), the pernicious among us (like you), the immoral among us (like you) are the ones who populate the most potent positions in our nation. What kind of example is that?  

That’s your example, Bob. LEAVE!

PLEASE!!!