Letters to the Editor (Nov. 5)

Who is responsible?

Editor:

The election is at hand and the following information is accurate, and by no means offers the total examples of the many nations reasonably well-governed during the COVID-19 world pandemic.

Under the national leadership of, measuring the distance with coffins (7 feet), laid end to end — the following results are as Oct. 8, 2020).

New Zealand: PM Jacinda Ardern; 25 deaths, 58 yards

South Korea: PM Chung Sye-kyun; 428 deaths, 999 yards

Vietnam: PM Nguyn Xuân Phúc; 35 deaths, 82 yards

Singapore; P.M. Lee Hsien Loong: 27 deaths, 63 yards

United States of America: President Donald Trump and VP Mike Pence; 229,000 deaths, 288.8 miles

So, who should be held responsible for the U.S. having the planet’s worst virus/death results and the severe damage to the employment economy?

A note to this comment, Oct. 1, by Luther Robertson: “The Founding Fathers of our country were guided by inspiration from our creator, and they demonstrated that by the results of our Constitution and Bill of Rights by giving us a Republic rather than a Democracy.”

Originally, only White men of property could vote (Republic), but after the passage of the 14th Amendment’s equality clause, the U.S. became a Democratic Republic, except of course for women and Native Americans (1920 and 1924).

And of course, I take great issue with the words “guided by inspiration from our creator,” because, for the first time in all human history the Founders gave this nation the first three words in the Preamble of the Constitution: “We the People.”

The preamble is the justification because statement for all that follows, as well as does the preamble to the Second Amendment. Yep, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State” is the justification because statement before the article that follows. Gun deaths on the streets and in the homes of the U.S. since 1968 (approximately 1.7 million coffins) exceed the total number of combat deaths from all the wars (400 years) of this nation, prior to and after the ratification of the Constitution, and, using the same coffin measurement as above, about 2,253 miles, but maybe a few miles less because far too many coffins were small or tiny.

So, what is the definition of public mass hysteria: “In sociology and psychology, mass hysteria (also known as mass psychogenic illness, collective hysteria, group hysteria, or collective obsessional behavior) is a phenomenon that transmits collective illusions of threats, whether real or imaginary, through a population and society as a result of rumors and fear.”

Can you think of a thousand examples of politically generated rumor/fear mongering?

Why can’t we be better?

Terry Mehaffey

Los Lunas

It’s not the same GOP

Editor:

My grandfather fought in World War II, and then worked as a nuclear technician in Oak Ridge, Tenn., for the Manhattan Project.

When I was a child, he enjoyed taking me to museums, showing me how to use one of the first home computers and teaching me to fly his Cessna. He taught me to be inquisitive and read a wide variety of books. He saw science and technology as the keys to a stable and comfortable future.

We also had long conversations about ethics, religion and philosophy. I didn’t always agree with him but he was OK with that. He believed a vote for a Republican candidate was a vote for science, technology and education for all. He was so proud to be an American.

My grandfather’s greatest fears were authoritarianism and bigotry. He came to the U.S. as a pre-teen with his parents and brother from what is now Belarus. Nearly all of his relatives who stayed behind were murdered by Hitler’s regime.

Throughout the Cold War, he worked as a translator for the United Nations. I know from our discussions when he was alive that my grandfather would find today’s Republican party unrecognizable.

I will forever miss my grandfather but I’m glad he hasn’t had to watch the sad transformation of the party in which he held so much faith.

Ashley Lewin

Belen