I wrote this on Facebook one evening:

Trump and Musk are deplorable.

Hillary was always right about this: "You know, ... you could put half of Trump's supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right? They're racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic – you name it...."

On November 8, 2017, one year after the election, Trump thanked the "deplorables" for his victory

The next morning, I thought, "I should have sent it to the newspaper." So I sent it to the LATimes. They did not print it.

Just what are homophobes afraid of?

The LATimes ran a lengthy profile of school board book banning activist Sonja Shaw. I dashed off a quick letter about what it seems such folks are afraid of, and why that's pretty stupid. I wrote:

Sonja Shaw says she is fighting policies that "pervert children." She should think back to her own teenage years. If she had been taught that gay people exist, would that have made her a lesbian?

For my first sentence, I quoted a phrase about what's she's afraid of, but I should have left that out, because in context, it sounds like I agree that being lesbian is a perversion. 

I usually wait at least a couple of hours after drafting a letter to re-read it later and maybe revise it. I did not do that this time, but I should have. Shortly after I sent it, I wished I could re-write it.

The Times printed no letters about the article. 

Scared little boy Donnie Trump

 

I have a nickname for Donald Trump like the ones he pins on others, one he's guaranteed to hate: 

Scared little boy Donnie Trump

He's scared of the truth, so he lies all the time. And now he's desperately scared of getting caught, too.

He boasts about being a great leader, but when he leaves the room, many consider him a dangerous buffoon and simply ignore his commands.

He acts like a little boy, including the name-calling. 

Last month, his niece said,  “Donald is and always has been a frightened little boy deep down.” I completely agree.

Scared little boy Donnie Trump

I sent a shorter version of this to the LATimes early this week. They did not publish it. 

As I was revising it, I thought I might send it to another paper and maybe also to Mary Trump. (I did neither.) It was only when I was looking for how to contact her that I came across her recent quote. 

And only while looking for a cartoon of Trump as a little boy to put at the top of this post did I come across this quote from Liza Donelly: "I began to draw Donald Trump in shorts. Simply because he acts like a schoolyard bully."

And then this (from 2017!): "Is it time for cartoonists to stop portraying Trump as a baby?" Oh, dear, I guess I'm really way behind the times.

Anti-vaxxers

Weeks ago, my cousin Mark Weiss posted this on Facebook:

Vaccine mandates are leading teachers who don't believe in science to quit, nurses who don't believe in medicine to quit, and cops who don't believe in public safety to quit. I don't really see a downside to this.

I like that a lot, and I quoted it to others. Later, I decided I should send it as a letter to the editor of the LATimes. I first asked Mark whether it was his own or whether he was quoting someone else. He said, "I’d seen a couple of things out there that resonated with me, and that was my amalgamation of what I’d seen, though it may have been closer to one or another. That may not be a big help, but frankly, I don’t recall it in detail."

So I sent it to the Times, prefaced with "Recently seen on Facebook:" They didn't print it.

Celebrity Trumps All ('21)

In the Los Angeles Times, Nicholas Goldberg wrote a column headlined "Caitlyn Jenner for governor of California? What a terrible idea"

My immediate response was one I've written about before. I sent it to the Times. They edited it slightly (adding "Donald" and "so"), and printed it today (second letter on the page):

When Arnold Schwarzenegger was governor of California, long before Donald Trump was president, I lamented, “Celebrity trumps all, so how can we overcome that?”
 

“Celebrity trumps all” is still the case, and I still don’t have the answer.

 

Impeachment

 I sent this letter to the Los Angeles Times (not published):

If the parties were reversed, if it were a Democratic former president on trial in a 50-50 Senate, he would be convicted.

 
I believe enough Democrats would have the courage to put country before party and their own re-election.

"Newsom choice let down Black women"

California governor Newsom appointed a Latino man to replace VP-elect Kamala Harris as Senator. A Los Angeles Times columnist insisted that it should have been a Black woman. I sent this letter in response (not published):

So many who are complaining about this are minimizing the VP-elect. Yes, there will be no Black woman in the Senate. But instead, there's a first-ever Black woman Vice President! That's a pretty good trade-off.

Trump and Covid-19

The night they first announced that Trump had tested positive for Coronavirus, I sent this letter to the Los Angeles Times (not published):

If he dies of it, I'll be sorry.
Sorry that I'll never get to see him in prison.

Confirming Supreme Court appointees

The day Ruth Bader Ginsburg died, I sent this letter to the Los Angeles Times (not published):

Mitch McConnell: a liar and proud of it.

Trump is a liar and never admits it, but McConnell is a liar and proud of it.

 

Birtherism again

When idiots started questioning Kamala Harris's birthright to U.S. citizenship, I had one immediate response. I used it as a comment on a couple of Facebook posts that mentioned the subject.

Days later I was kicking myself, saying I should have sent it as a letter to the newspaper. But the next day, the Los Angeles Times had an op-ed about the topic, and that gave me a chance to send them my letter after all. They printed it today:

I hope the new birtherism has the same result as the 2008 version: The Democrat is elected.

Social Distancing

After the governor asked us to stay at home, I sent this letter to the Los Angeles Times (not published):

New weekly catch-up with family and friends:
What did you do this week?
Stayed at home.
And what did you do this week?
Stayed at home.

What liars do

Still thinking about Trump's inevitable pardon of Stone, I've got another letter ready:

Of course the Liar-in-Chief thinks lying to the FBI is no big deal. What did you expect?

Update 14 July 2020: Trump commuted Stone's sentence July 10th. I sent this letter to the Los Angeles Times that day. They did not publish it. 

Pardons

Anticipating Trump's pardoning Roger Stone, I drafted a letter to send when he did it. First, I checked the Constitution, which says, "[The President] shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment." 

So I wrote this succinct note:

Other than impeachment, the President's pardon power is absolute. As Lord Acton predicted, this corrupts absolutely. 

Stone is due to be sentenced today. But, two days ago, Trump pardoned a bunch of others. When I saw the strongly condemnatory Los Angeles Times editorial about that, I went ahead and sent my note. Today, they published a revised version:

Disregarding the possibility that Congress can impeach him, the president’s pardon power is absolute. As Lord Acton predicted, this corrupts absolutely.

I think my original is not only shorter and better, but more accurate. I'm no lawyer, but I think the wording in the Constitution means that the President can't pardon, say, a judge who's been impeached, as well as a President who's been impeached.

Impeachment

I sent this letter first to the New York Times, and then, a week later, to the Los Angeles Times. Neither published it:

Republican Senators will only abandon Trump when they feel that supporting him will threaten their own re-election.

The real traitor

I sent this letter to the Los Angeles Times (not published):

     Mitch McConnell says impeachment will fail 

     "with me as Majority Leader."

     Now there's the true traitor.

On personal data privacy

When I saw Mike Godwin's op-ed in the Los Angeles Times, I recognized his name from CPSR and RISKS. And reading the piece reminded me of a handout I used to give my students. I sent this letter (not published):

Mike Godwin urges a tech code of ethics concerning censorship and privacy policies. The Code of Fair Information Practices would be an excellent start on the privacy part. Proposed in 1973 (!), it has five principles:

• There must be no personal data record-keeping systems whose very existence is secret.
• There must be a way for a person to find out what information about the person is in a record and how it is used.
• There must be a way for a person to prevent information about the person that was obtained for one purpose from being used or made available for other purposes without the person's consent.
• There must be a way for a person to correct or amend a record of identifiable information about the person.
• Any organization creating, maintaining, using, or disseminating records of identifiable personal data must assure the reliability of the data for their intended use and must take precautions to prevent misuses of the data.

Dixie School District

The Los Angeles Times ran a story last week about how some in Marin County want to change the name of the Dixie school district.  The controversy has split the community. I sent this letter:

If the name came from Mary Dixie, simply use her full name. Change the name from 'Dixie' to 'Mary Dixie'.

My letter was not printed, but another with the same idea was:

Here is a simple solution to the problem: The school district should take the full name of the person for whom it was named.

It would then be called the Mary Dixie School District, more clearly honoring the woman for whom it was named.

Susan Sherman, Covina

Trump's border wall

My name is in today's Los Angeles Times. But it's not quite “my letter.” I'm only quoting an anonymous someone else.

Rodney Hoffman of Montecito Heights favors deception:

Recently seen on Facebook: “Trump should just lie and say the wall is already built. His supporters will believe him, and the rest of us will save billions of dollars.”

Sloppy math

In response to a glaring error in one sentence of this op-ed, I sent the following letter to the Los Angeles Times (not published):

Teicholz says, "The claims ... have been shown ... to be correct only 0% to 20% of the time." 

Fine. But she then says, "This means that 80% to 100% of the time, they're wrong."

That's completely wrong. It means they might be wrong, but they might be right, too. We can't know.

Amending the constitution

The Los Angeles Times recently ran an op-ed piece by Michael Kinsley. The print version was headlined "Leave the electoral college alone." I was puzzled why anyone would say that in California. I was annoyed that he didn't even say why until the very end. I sent this reply (not published):

Finally, in the last paragraph, Kinsley gives his reason to leave the electoral college alone: launching a constitutional amendment might bring on other amendments.

That's the best he can do? Abolishing the electoral college wouldn't call for a constitutional convention, just an amendment. Kinsley would have us never amend the constitution. Pretty stupid.