Anthony Sanders’ Nov. 7 column “Republican trifecta offers party new opportunities” makes an astonishingly naive assumption: Reforms that entail diminishing the power of the federal government will benefit the nation.

Sanders lauds former President Ronald Reagan for a dramatic cut in income taxes, yet fails to note that this fiscal policy produced the largest-ever increase in our national debt.

The elimination of agencies such as the Departments of Education and Commerce are proposed, when the current administration is attempting to hold schools accountable to federal standards and seeing rampant corporate corruption injure tens of thousands trading on the vaunted free market.

Most astonishing of all, Sanders proposes the institution of a flat income tax, at a time when CEOs make several hundred times what their average employees make and when distribution of wealth is even more uneven than in the gilded age of robber barons.

The federal government exists to protect and aid the citizens. It is not a self-serving leviathan to be slain, but is our best defense and support. Washington is not the enemy.