Letter: Re-establishing the record

I am responding to a Sept. 11 letter to the editor claiming the American dream is being reversed. His dystopian views include negative opinions about all politicians, legal asylum-seeking immigrants and scary school curricula. He even claims that a temporary, economy-saving stimulus, is “welfare” and that encouraging vaccinations somehow hurts families instead of saving lives.

He calls our withdrawal from Afghanistan a blunder but fails to mention that the plan being followed was one negotiated by the previous administration directly with the Taliban and bypassing the participation of the central government in Kabul. The airlift in fact has been very successful and even after our withdrawal, Americans, foreign nationals and other Afghani citizens who helped us in the war, are still being evacuated. This “forever war” and failed attempt at nation building has cost us trillions of dollars and will cost us trillions in obligations for veterans’ care over the next 30 years.

I share the letter writer’s fear about the future of democracy but for different reasons. Many states are making it more difficult to vote and states such as Arizona and Georgia are actively trying to make it possible for partisans to remove the power of the secretary of state and independent elections officials, replacing them with partisan Republicans who can overturn elections results they don’t like.

Perhaps the biggest threat to our democracy is the “big lie” of our ex-president that he won the 2020 election. He lost the election by millions of votes and this has been verified in court case after court case, and in recount after recount. All of this undermines faith in American elections, in its institutions, and in the rule of law itself.

Donald Noonan

Crystal Lake