To the Editor:
Second Opinion.
For too long, the Trump experience was a mystery to me. In the 1980’s he was a joke, another gaudy glitterati who pretended relevance, power, and success while he conjured repeated business failures, almost all involving lies and misrepresentations, freely threw friends under the bus, and was famous for disregard of anyone’s interests but his own.
A lot of Republicans think he’s a hollow man or even a fool. What they do admire about him seems to be his "righteousness" in disdain for norms, democratic institutions, reverence for the powerful and rich, tolerance for racism, his lack of compassion and duty toward the “undeserving” (Puerto Rico). He has glorified the selfish impulses that we all have and made of them a virtue.
Fortunately, the GOP has long nurtured, among others, a group of people for whom the conflict between good and evil is a regular tension and who eagerly consider an apocalyptic confrontation. Enter Donald Trump, in need of a zealous new congregation hungry for a civilian deity in showman's clothing.
And that, I think, is the key. It is no mistake that at the last Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC), the Republicans created a “golden bull” and wheeled it around so the faithful could put their hands on it for “energy and inspiration.” So long as this "god" and his disciples spout "Christian values" they can practice all the corporate giveaways, assaults on democracy, and voter suppression they want. In this exchange, they will believe whatever voodoo canards support their plan to force-march the rest of country to the end of times. No matter that a hybrid authoritarian/religious state is a combination that has been historically disastrous.
Democracy cannot endure such a betrayal of its basic principles. American history reminds us that thousands of our ancestors left their homelands at great cost and peril and came to a place where neither king nor cardinal could impose their will.
Kelly Scoles,
Fillmore

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To the Editor:
According to Joe Biden, "the white supremacists are a greater danger to our country than Isis or Al Quada". I found this statement which he has been saying a lot lately to be outrageous Ok....who are they? Have they been rioting, burning businesses, vandalizing, killing cops, stealing, turning our great cities into ruins? No, they have not, they are simply good Americans who believe in law and order, freedom of speech, the right to bear arms, and they don't agree with the far-left lunacies. They are no threat to our country; it simply exists in the feeble mind of Joe Biden and the democratic party.
When Kamala Harris speaks of PURGING the Republican party, words associated with leaders like Stalin and Hitler it's time for the American people to wake up and realize we live in dangerous times.
Huguette Johnson
Fillmore