Iam a lifelong Democrat. I salute the eight U.S. senators in the Democratic caucus who stepped up to stop this horrific federal shutdown, because ending this shutdown was a moral imperative, (“ Senate approves bill to end the shutdown, sending it to the House, ” Nov. 10).

The Democrats could have and should have spun it as a heroic victory for millions of suffering Americans. Instead, once again, the party failed to find an effective message even for this most basic of commonsense, ethical actions, taken to curtail further disaster.

The coming health care crisis is real, but secondary to the current day-to-day suffering caused by loss of SNAP food aid, jobs and the safety of the flying public. If Republicans fail to follow through on promises to revisit health care, the fallout will be

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