Editor,

I was mystified by Timothy Hazelo’s letter to the editor in the Dec. 17 Whidbey News-Times.

He argued that Rep. Rick Larsen should not vote for the two articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump because he would lose votes among the people Hazelo knows, and that, in any case, the Democrat claims against Donald Trump are ridiculous.

First, all members of Congress take an oath to defend the U.S. Constitution, just as a sheriff takes an oath to uphold the law whether or not the people who elected him like it.

Second, as anyone who listened to the impeachment hearings would conclude, the evidence that President Trump showed disregard for the constitution is compelling. Christianity Today, a conservative Christian publication just wrote, “The president of the United States attempted to use his political power to coerce a foreign leader to harass and discredit one of the president’s political opponents.

“That is not only a violation of the Constitution; more important is profoundly immoral.”

Trump’s response was to call Christianity Today a failing left-wing publication. This is as absurd as calling a giraffe a mammal with a short neck.

Surely you don’t have to be a psychiatrist to conclude that a person who lacks empathy, lies constantly, and whose solution to climate change is to call it a Chinese hoax is unfit to be president.

This is not a matter of left or right but of using good judgment. So why do a substantial number of people continue to support President Trump?

That is the mystery, at least for me.

Steen Halling

Greenbank