Yearns for better candidates

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To the Editor:

Since I prefer the Democratic Party, I have never voted for a Republican in the 16 presidential elections since I turned 21.

But there have been a number of Republicans whom I have held in positive regard, including: Fiorello La Guardia, Wendell Wilkie, Earl Warren, Nelson Rockefeller, Dwight Eisenhower, Jacob Javits, Kenneth Keating, Mac Mathias, Mark Hatfield, Margaret Chase Smith, Edward Brooke, Ralph Flanders, William Weld, Warren Rudman, Olympia Snowe, Christie Whitman, Alan Simpson.

If, to my regret, the electorate chooses to put a republican in the White House, it is to my benefit — and the benefit of all Americans — for that Republican to emerge from a primary contest in which contenders are drawn from the most intelligent, thoughtful, well informed, reasonable people within the Republican ranks.

But what were we offered this election year? Consider the last four men standing in the Republican primary:

A likeable but delusional septuagenarian who worships at the shrine of the late Friedrich Hayek. A pompous, insufferable egocentric. An obsessed, impassioned religious zealot. And one reasonably normal human being who demeaned himself by clumsy efforts to persuade Tea Partiers that he truly is an ultra-right wing troglodyte.

Our democracy would be healthier if our two major parties could somehow manage to put forth candidates from among their very best and brightest men and women, who could command respect for their intellect and character, even if we may disagree with the policies they advocate.

R.E.L. Knight

West Tisbury