Readers Write: Unmooring of America, presidential election and disability awareness

Opinion editor’s note: Star Tribune Opinion publishes letters from readers online and in print each day. To contribute, click here.

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In his opinion piece (“In America, we are unmoored,” July 24), Peter Hutchinson bemoans the state of our politics and proceeds to both-sides his argument by mixing in a variety of issues, some highly impactful (for example, widespread bank fraud, wealth inequity, climate change) and others perhaps less so (“cancel culture,” the loss of paper maps and too many media outlets). He then claims that Democrats and Republicans have switched sides, with Republicans the party of the working class and Democrats of the moneyed elites. After a bit of elaboration and blaming it all on the absence of “leaders,” he winds up in the very last paragraph saying basically that Republicans are the problem and it’s up to the Democrats to fix it. This final burst of honesty and clarity comes way too late in the piece, and he never fully articulates the underlying truth: that the Republican Party has turned to hate and division as its core tactic, and that it will never solve the real problems he so meticulously enumerates. Next time, it would be better to skip the attempt to blame both sides and go right to the heart of the problem.

Timothy R. Church, St. Paul

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Hutchinson provides a comprehensive list of much that is wrong in America today, fueling “our (lack of) belief, faith, and trust in America itself and in ourselves.” It is hard to be positive and support our current leadership that has allowed this under their watch, but he feels that some of the causes may be beyond the control of politics. He states that we all need to work to improve our country and world. We may have peace with most of our family, friends, neighbors, fellow workers and institutional memberships, but how about the overall good of all world citizens? Change is hard and changes are coming too fast for many, especially oldsters like me.

Personally, I feel that too many are drifting away from the tenants of their faiths, rather embracing the distractions of the world, bereft of love for God and neighbor as all important to salvation, that “love, wisdom and compassion toward one another” that Hutchinson espouses. Unfortunately, Hutchinson concludes substituting any call for unity with criticism of Republicans as the party supporting fear and division, ruining his entire premise!

Michael Tillemans, Minneapolis

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Thanks to Hutchinson for his eloquent and provocative commentary and especially for appealing to Democrats to support “a welcoming path to a better America that offers every American a safe anchorage in these confusing and uncertain times.” However, his opening lament that “something is broken in America” is too pessimistic. Instead, we should take heart from Amanda Gorman, whose poem at President Joe Biden’s inauguration told us that we are “a nation that isn’t broken, but simply unfinished” and that “There is always light, if only we’re brave enough to see it — If only we’re brave enough to be it.” This wise young woman — in her own words “a skinny Black girl descended from slaves and raised by a single mother” — tells us that our country in fact has a strong foundation for responding to Hutchinson’s appeal. So let’s all get to work.

John Satorius, Minneapolis

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Vice President Kamala Harris should have been in Washington, D.C., Wednesday as a “leader” since President Joe Biden didn’t show up (”To Congress, Netanyahu vows total victory,” July 25). That’s what the vice president’s duties are, “stand in” as the president, but nope. Another antisemitic snub to our number one ally in the Middle East.

If you’re the “Democratic” presidential nominee, you should have shown a pinch of international leadership and presided over Congress during the visit by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Instead, she snuffed her first “presidential” opportunity and didn’t attend along with many dozens of other Democrat congressmen.

In the meantime, thousands of pro-Palestine and Hamas protesters chanted death to America and removed the American flags at Union Station while raising the Palestine flag over the square and vandalized statues, government property and private businesses (”Thousands protest in D.C. during Netanyahu’s visit,” July 25).

Silence and crickets from the administration and Democrats. So sad — but, go Kamala!

Dan Hetman, Anoka

The Star Tribune ought to be ashamed to have reprinted such a false and incendiary article (”House GOP leaders ask members to stop racial attacks on Harris,” July 25).

No one in the GOP has made “racial attacks” on Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris. Some Republicans have pointed out that DEI, or diversity, equity and inclusion, was a factor in her being in her present position.

In 2020, candidate Joe Biden specifically promised he was going to choose a Black woman for the VP job — a clear case of using DEI to fill a position. People who have problems with DEI (and they are not all conservatives) believe that using race, sex or other identity characteristics as a job qualification is wrong because none of those characteristics speak to a person’s fitness for the job.

It is flat out wrong to state that conservatives oppose DEI because it leads to “minorities getting jobs over white candidates.” That is an evil twisting of the truth. People who oppose DEI do so because weighting irrelevant factors (race, sex) when choosing a candidate necessarily devalues relevant factors (competence, experience). It casts a cloud on every minority hired under the system, an unfair burden.

I agree that it is wise for Republicans to stop talking about Harris as a DEI candidate. Not because being skeptical of DEI processes is racist, but because it’s so easy for dishonest, hack journalists to twist their meaning.

Catherine Walker, Minneapolis

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I think that as a country, we are finally coming to the conclusion that diversity, equity and inclusion maybe wasn’t the be all end all. In some cases, hiring the best qualified people isn’t the worst idea. If your child is at death’s door and needs life-saving surgery, wouldn’t you want the most qualified surgeon? You wouldn’t look at their race, religion or sexual orientation. Many people are touting Vice President Kamala Harris as our potential first Black female president. As a woman, I want a first female president who I can be proud of, not one who is going to make me cringe every time she opens her mouth. We have got to have more qualified people than this!

Sheila Knoedler, Eden Prairie

No one should be surprised by the latest revelations of former President Donald Trump’s great insensitivity to people who suffer extreme afflictions (”Nephew: Trump said disabled should die,” July 25). At one of his rallies he struck a palsied pose and mocked a reporter who suffered arthrogryposis, a congenital condition affecting the joints. John Lennon said it best: “The one thing you can’t hide is when you’re crippled inside.”

Doug Williams, Robbinsdale