I find Susan Collins’ temporizing about Donald Trump’s latest utterances deeply disappointing. What does it take for a Republican senator to stand on principle, as Margaret Chase Smith did many years ago, and speak up forcefully and directly, not straddle a fence? Does loyalty to party trump all decency (no pun intended)?

If the party’s presidential candidate is a racist and a misogynist, an actual dummy when it comes to serious matters of policy and substance; when that candidate encourages violence, and speaks approvingly of thugs like Vladimir Putin, then we come to Thomas Friedman’s column in last week’s New York Times, “Dump the G.O.P. for a Grand New Party.”

He writes:

“Today’s GOP is to governing what Trump University is to education – an ethically challenged enterprise that enriches and perpetuates itself by shedding all pretense of standing for real principles…

“It is just an empty shell, selling pieces of itself to the highest bidders – policy by policy – a little to the Tea Party over here, a little to Big Oil over there, a little to the gun lobby, to antitax zealots, to climate-change deniers.”

Which brings us to national Republican leaders, including Sen. Collins.

“…we know just how little they are attached to any principles, because today’s Republic Party’s elders have told us so by (with a few notable exceptions) being so willing to throw their support behind a presidential candidate whom they know is utterly ignorant of policy, has done no homework, has engaged in racist attacks on a sitting judge, has mocked a disabled reporter, has impugned an entire religious community and has tossed off ignorant proposals for walls, for letting allies go it alone and go nuclear and for overturning trade treaties, rules of war and nuclear agreements in ways that would be wildly destabilizing if he took office.”

I am reminded of the classic union organizing song from the l930s: “Which side are you on boys, which side are you on?”

Sen. Collins – which side are you on

Samuel Zaitlin
Biddeford