The article by Wayne O’Leary, “Trump’s Goldilocks’ Economy” [3/15/18 TPP], seems a bit churlish in barely crediting the president as an economic cheerleader who has kept the economy moving along. I believe he has been an effective cheerleader but I also believe that, in the longer term, his defunding of some education and research initiatives will cause problems down the road. The economy is still being mildly stimulated in both the monetary (low interest rates) and fiscal (low taxes) sense. This situation has been sustained for quite a while and may go on for some time into the future. But like an athlete who exercises and has good coaching but who neglects diet and sleep patterns, when a recession finally does come, it may be deeper (due to “athletic exhaustion”) than it would have been under a more responsible president.
If such a recession hits before November 2018 or 2020, there will be a “blue wave.” If it hits in early 2019, the GOP might survive.
The letter, “Don’t Take Democracy for Granted” paints an accurate and scary picture of Trump supporters, but leaves out two facts. Many of them are armed and some of them believe that God has mandated them to act. Readers of TPP should be wary that a sudden economic decline could provide an entrée for a “shock doctrine” attenuation of Democracy — possibly including martial law. My hope is that there will be no crises this year and that after November there will be a Democratic Congress with congresspeople well aware of the possibility of the situation described above.
John D. Palmer, Charleston W.V.
During the past 14 months President Trump has apparently unilaterally amended and expanded the veto power in the Constitution regarding the selection of Cabinet members. Although Mitt Romney appears to have been Trump’s first choice for Secretary of State, rumors have circulated that recently re-elected Russian President Putin was unhappy with the choice and was able to veto Romney. The second choice was Mike Pompeo. Putin did not veto Pompeo. Perhaps Putin hoped he would be considered to replace General H.R. McMaster as the next National Security Adviser after McMaster’s anticipated ouster.
Putin was not on any ballot in the United States in November 2016, but he may have had a significant role in the running of our country for more than a year.
Edward L. Koven, Highland Park, Ill.
In replacing Rex Tillerson, one of the last remaining moderate-voiced “adults” in the administration, with bellicose hyena Mike Pompeo, this deplorable President is assembling a War Cabinet. War is his “trump card” to distract from a Mueller-fueled criminal indictment, and North Korea his likely target. The blowhard bully said so himself hours before his State of the Union speech, “there is tremendous divisiveness in the nation and I want to unify the country but it is hard to do it without a traumatic event affecting Americans.”
A Democratic majority in Congress could prevent the catastrophe of nuclear war by impeaching this traitor who has dismantled our diplomatic corps, allowed his unqualified advisors with no security clearance see our country’s most secret intelligence, and who the Russians groomed to become their “useful idiot.”
It is not too early to organize voters to turn out in November and turn Republicans out of Congress.
Bruce Joffe, Piedmont, Calif.
Students are motivated and on the march against gun violence. I say hooray for them! But other “adult” figures are not so supportive. The establishment politicians and administrators are frantically trying to get in front of the students to control and ultimately to diminish their actions. Typical of the actions are school district administrators, who support student rights “as long as the walkout does not advocate for a political position.”
But gun control is inherently political. One person’s “sensible gun control laws” is another’s “infringement on essential Constitutional liberties.” So far, the Establishment, led by Republicans in Congress and in the White House, value “constitutional liberties” above “sensible laws.” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said he will not call any gun control legislation in the Senate. The House Republicans are even worse; the very thought of any controls on gun ownership or use results in angry calls from the NRA and its supporters.
If young people are going to get any results, they will have to do it through the ballot box. The “kids” who are 18 or older should register and vote. Those under 18 should work for candidates who are going to do something about the situation. In many cases, this will involve unseating (usually) Republican lawmakers who won’t do anything for those who will.
We older people have done a tremendous injustice to our youth. It’s time for them to step up, call us out and do something good for this country.
Frank L. Schneider, Chicago, Ill.
As an aging octogenarian, I vividly remember as a young boy the periodic drills that had me hiding under my desk at school, the shelter my father built in our basement out of concrete, and all the other precautionary steps we and the rest of the nation took post 1945 to keep safe. After the atomic bomb was dropped in Hiroshima 8/6/45 and Nagasaki 8/9/45, the horrendous results of 200,000 lives being lost, in addition to the devastation of homes and property, was eventually publicized and shown throughout the world, The forthcoming realization of weaponry that had the potential to end societies/civilization itself was the impetus for our rethinking and we sought to lessen “stockpiles” and sign national “pacts” for the reduction of “atomic weaponry” and a prohibition of other nations acquiring the same ability ever.
The bogus and archaic mentality of the NRA and its defenders utilizing the Second Amendment’s noted ambiguity over the years when the “musket” had the capacity (1776) of getting off a single round to maim or kill someone in about a minute and a half; compared to todays (2018) capacity of an automatic rifle to roughly 100 rounds effecting mass killings anywhere. We must apply the same type of “reality rethinking” regarding atomic bombs to “automatic weaponry before they provide the same type of carnage as the “A bomb on every hideous occurrence.
We are shamefully becoming one of the most corrupt and violent nations of the Westernized world; gun deaths annually (Brazil 50,000, US approximately 30,000) and that dire status is enhanced with the bribery of the NRA and other autocratic adherents in “buying” our politicians.
This nation is primed and ready after the past half century of pillaging and mass killings; and it’s time to adhere to Alexander Hamilton’s “Revolution every hundred years” advocacy.
Frank C. Rohrig, Milford, Conn.
Re: “Those Who Do Nothing on Gun Control Fail Our Children” [3/15/18 TPP]. We know, of course, that the original intent for the Second Amendment was to turn every male civilian into an armed soldier to protect his country in the event of foreign invasion.
But even as the country grew in strength and established a competent Army and Navy, it elevated every citizen’s right to bear arms to an almost sacrosanct status.
And that made perfect sense to a slave-owning nation which was also determined to engage in ethnic cleansing. After all, thousands of citizens owned slaves and needed guns to recapture those who escaped.
The rest of white Americans needed land, so they had to have guns to succeed in their campaign of genocide against Native Americans to take their land.
And now the Second Amendment is indirectly responsible for Americans killing more Americans than Muslim terrorists would ever dream of killing.
Perhaps Thomas Jefferson predicted the horror that Americans would unleash with their beloved guns when he wrote: “I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just.”
David Quintero, Monrovia, Calif.
D.A.R.E. — as in Demand A Redo Election — citizens of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, now that you know the truth about Russian operative involvement in posting of a multitude of false news stories on social media that bled over into the news and were spread like the flu, person to person, and affected the election. Then get out and vote knowing not only the truth but that the solipsistic occupant of the Oval Office is increasingly deranged and a danger to the country and the world that must be removed. People who get out who stayed home instead of voting for Clinton in 2016 because you were so demoralized by the constant sliming of Hillary by Russian operatives get out and vote this time. Citizens of these three states please do for America what Trump’s collaborators in the republican party prevent the senate and Congress from doing. Remove the greatest danger to America and the world.
Charles Leach, Lynchburg, Ohio
[Editor’s Note: Sorry, but there is no constitutional provision for a “redo” of the presidential election.]
Here it is March 22 and I am already up to page 4 of your 3/15/18 edition. That’s because I took speed reading when I was a lot younger. I appreciated both subject letters, especially Mark Ivan’s “Don’t Take Democracy for Granted,” but Evan Koven’s letter, “Give People What They Want,” if realized [the resignation or impeachment of Trump] would usher in Pence. Pence has two brain cells which is two more than Trump, but that hardly qualifies him for the job. One of our nukes to be tested or possibly to be tested would blot out the sun for months. The darkness would cover an area the size of the US, which would mean no crops anywhere. That would mean that unless there is a planet out there with life-supporting environment, God will have to begin again his, her, creative act. We would, hopefully, have the hope that Pence would not be His instrument for recreation.
Bernard J. Berg, Easton, Pa.
If you are in the GOP, you hate paying your taxes for welfare. But did you know that those welfare dollars really go to millionaires and billionaires?
Look at the billionaire Walton family, owners of Walmart. They don’t pay their workers a livable wage, so their workers have to apply for welfare just to survive. Nothing prevents the Waltons from paying a livable wage, except their greed. In 2015 Walmart made $15 billion in profits, yet if they paid their workers $15 an hour they would still have made $10 billion and their workers would not be coming to you and me for welfare money. So, in reality, we are paying this welfare money to Walmart’s owners, not their workers.
Lee Knohl, Evanston Ill.
From The Progressive Populist, April 15, 2018
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