Public trust in Congress is collapsing, largely because many lawmakers have spent decades in office, growing wealthy while claiming to serve the people. The financial perks of power are so enticing that many refuse to leave, clinging to their seats long past their prime. For some, the likelihood of dying in office seems higher than choosing to retire.
Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and former Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell have both experienced health-related incidents over the years that have cast doubts on their fitness for office. McConnell has had his share of freeze-ups during press conferences, while Pelosi has occasionally struggled with coherent speech, prompting questions about their cognitive health.
This December, both experienced significant falls. Pelosi broke her hip while traveling in Luxembourg, and McConnell sprained his wrist and sustained facial injuries at a GOP luncheon. It’s a troubling trend when our most influential leaders are repeatedly involved in accidents that undermine their public service.
Yet after these incidents, conservatives immediately called for McConnell to step down. What was missing? Any similar demand from the left for the 84-year-old former House speaker to retire. On Wednesday, after the 82-year-old McConnell suffered multiple falls and was later seen in a wheelchair, conservatives once again took to social media urging him to resign—without hesitation. The silence from Democrats on Pelosi’s future, however, was deafening.
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Compare that to the Democrats, who spent four years insisting Joe Biden was “sharp as a tack” and smearing anyone who questioned his mental fitness as a conspiracy theorist. When the Hur report came out last year, they were outraged at the blunt descriptions of Biden’s poor memory, insisting they’d seen Biden behind the scenes and that everything was all good. The mainstream media blamed evidence of his cognitive decline on the childhood stutter he’d long overcome.
It wasn’t until after Biden’s disastrous debate performance against Trump that we suddenly learned the same people who had insisted he was fully in command were, in private, deeply concerned about his mental fitness. After Biden dropped out of the race — and even more so after the election — more confessions emerged, revealing just how long Democrats had been covering for him. They knowingly propped up a cognitively failing president, pushing the country into a constitutional crisis because, in reality, Biden wasn’t the one running the show. They had a perfect opportunity to admit the truth after the release of the Hur report and use it as political cover to push him out. But they didn’t. Why? Because clinging to power mattered more than being honest with the American people.
Why is it that conservatives can be honest about when it’s time to put a Republican out to pasture, but Democrats deny, deflect, and attack at the mere suggestion that one of their own is a few fries short of a Happy Meal? Remember, the four years we endured of Democrats pretending that Joe Biden was sharp as a tack came after four years of Democrats and their media allies baselessly questioning President Trump’s mental fitness and insisting that the 25th Amendment ought to be invoked.
It’s time for a change. Members of both parties are reluctant to retire, but at least Republican voters are more willing to admit when a Republican should pass the torch. Both Pelosi and McConnell have shown they can’t hack it anymore, and both should step aside. The American public wants fresh voices, and frankly, when you’re in your eighties, you really ought to enjoy retirement, not be in charge of making decisions that affect the entire country.
At least Republican voters are honest about it.
