Mash Notes, Hate Mail & Other Correspondence

To the Editor, Most of the current red states have been red states for decades. Some large areas in these states do not have any viable Democratic Party presence at all. Can we expect a red state that loses a considerable number of key offices and majorities to allow the will of the voters to prevail? Will they even count votes properly in a situation they will lose in? The national scene is troubling now, but at the state level will we see red state coups resist democracy at the state level? My guess is that we will see red state voters throw Republicans out …

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“People used to think that learning to read evidenced human progress; they still celebrate the decline of illiteracy as a great victory; they condemn countries with a large proportion of illiterates; they think that reading is a road to freedom. All this is debatable, for the important thing is not to be able to read, but to understand what one reads, to reflect on and judge what one reads. Outside of that, reading has no meaning (and even destroys certain automatic qualities of memory and observation). But to talk about critical faculties and discernment is to talk about something far above primary education and to …

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Dear Editor: Mother’s Day. I read a lot of science fiction. It has come a long way from space monsters to political commentary. Human beings are diverse. We have an odd sex life, compared to other species of mammals. We can get pregnant any month in the three decades we are fecund. It used to be shameful for a woman to not be pregnant after her first menses. That may seem like ancient history, but the nagging from would-be grandparents shows it is not. When I was raised, and schooled, in the Catholic faith, I remember Pope John XXIII, who was in office when I …

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To the Editor: Gonzalo Boye is the lawyer for the President of Catalonia, Carles Puigdemont, and members of his government, who, in 2017, accompanied him to Belgium after holding a referendum on Catalan independence. They went into exile in Belgium because they saw that the Spanish justice system would condemn them even though organising referendums is not a crime in the Spanish penal code. This is exactly how it turned out, because the Spanish justice system sentenced the members of Puigdemont’s government who stayed in Catalonia to between nine and 13 years in prison. Thanks to the work of lawyer Gonzalo Boye and the international …

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To the Editor: President Biden has consistently promoted bipartisan support for legislation that would help solve America’s pressing problems. This is a laudable aspiration and necessary to overcome the dreary legislative deadlock that has hamstrung public policy. Bipartisan solutions, however, require two parties that share a vision of the common good and participate in reasoned analysis to achieve compromise solutions. It is questionable whether these elements exist in the political discourse of the Trump era. The greatest impediment to bipartisanship is the Trump-dominated Republican Party. It has degenerated into tribal loyalty to Trump and has become solely focused on the preservation of its power. It …

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“You can get a lot done with a bayonet, but sitting on one is uncomfortable”– from Secondhand Time, Svetlana Alexievich I. Things you can do with a bayonet Kill people. Persuade people to do things they don’t want to do by threatening to kill them. Control unruly crowds by threatening to kill them. Control peaceful crowds by threatening to kill them. Control your wife by threatening to kill her. Rob a bank or convenience store by threatening to kill the clerk. Wave it in the air on your front porch or in your backyard to demonstrate your manliness. Eat peas with it (this one’s challenging). …

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