Editor:

Wednesday’s “Thanks Obama” column targeted the entirely wrong person responsible for the shutdown, not to mention it contained some misinformation. Mount Vernon was mistakenly closed and reopened shortly thereafter, specifically because it’s not federal property.

First off, the GOP is currently stonewalling on a law that has already been passed by Congress and been held up by the Supreme Court as constitutional. So there’s no leg to stand on for the law somehow being illegal.

In addition, there are actually many House Republicans willing to pass a clean budget law without messing with the ACA, but currently Boehner has refused to allow any of these bipartisan budget bills to even be voted on. So if you want a person to blame for the shutdown, look at the guy responsible for forestalling a passed budget.

Secondly, the ACA was the platform that Obama ran on and won by a landslide 130 electoral votes. Still don’t believe that the ACA is something wanted by the people of the United States? The Mississippi insurance exchange is hitting five times the expected web traffic, 250,000 hits per second. You don’t get five times the expected web traffic for a measure you claimed was “largely unnecessary.”

Pay attention to the news instead of rhetoric talking points and you’ll see that the GOP is getting slammed in the opinion polls, as they are responsible for this mess and not the president.

Austin Peasley

WSU Alumnus