Maybe it’s because I live in Maine, and carry that Scarlet Letter “A” on my chest, that causes me to see Susan Collins as a totally faux moderate Republican. She is crafty enough to be loyal to her party (if you can call it that) while at the same time strategically and cunningly taking supposed bipartisan positions. It has taken years of honing her political craft to plan how and when to pull out the spurious cross-party playing cards.

When Collins promised to favor term limits and “run for only two terms,” stays for five and prepares for a sixth, there goes honesty, transparency and trust. Those characteristics were also totally absent when Collins amazingly stated “I believe that the President has learned from this case…” as an excuse for her acquittal vote on Trump’s pre-insurrection impeachment. That he could incite an insurrection was what Trump learned. The naivety, absurdity and pretense of Collins is what I learned. The same could be said for her deceptive, meaningless, inconsequential second impeachment vote.

Sen. Collins assured the world that Brett Kavanaugh would protect Roe v. Wade and uphold Constitutional law. Instead, along with his politically lawless cohorts on the bench, he sided with Texas vigilantism.

I am not old enough to clearly remember Margaret Chase Smith, but her courage against McCarthy and her legacy harkens back to a different time and different values. I have to believe that her actions, deeds and promises, if she were alive today, would be totally different from who we have now. Smith’s legacy requires no rose-colored glasses.

Oh, that Scarlet Letter “A”. Yes, I am from “Away.” Then again, except for the Wabanaki and the other Native Americans, aren’t we all?

Jeffrey Runyon,
Brunswick