To the Editor:
Re “Trump Caps Return to Power, Vowing to Stop a U.S. ‘Decline’” (entrance web page, Jan. 21) and “Trump Grants Sweeping Clemency to All Jan. 6 Rioters” (nytimes.com, Jan. 20):
What a disappointing Inauguration Day! I don’t know which was extra disheartening: outgoing President Biden’s flurry of pre-emptive pardons, actually on the eleventh hour, or incoming President Trump’s dour Inaugural Handle, satirically promising a brand new “golden age of America.”
To shut out an upsetting day, Mr. Trump introduced his personal sweeping pardons or commutations for the almost 1,600 folks charged within the Jan. 6, 2021, violent assaults on the Capitol, the very seat of our democracy — a call that has elicited bipartisan condemnation.
It’s obvious that the American presidency is being more and more performed in an imperial method, and if it continues this fashion, we’re headed to changing into a banana republic.
Jack Nargundkar
Cary, N.C.
To the Editor:
If President Trump’s thought of legislation and order is to grant clemency to insurrectionists who attacked and broken the Capitol, assaulted policemen and threatened to hold Vice President Mike Pence, this nation is in large bother!
Elaine Sloan
New York
To the Editor:
No matter wisp of hope existed for a extra rational and conciliatory President Trump was fully extinguished, and the specter of the onset of an autocratic period assured, by Mr. Trump’s Inaugural Handle, which mirrored however far exceeded his worst marketing campaign rants.
The speech should function a dire warning and a name to arms for each American who nonetheless believes in a democratic type of authorities, a binding Structure and the rule of legislation.
Gerald Harris
New York
The author is a retired New York Metropolis Felony Courtroom decide.
To the Editor:
We live in thrilling occasions. What was considered the unattainable dream has been realized. Donald J. Trump is again within the White Home as our forty seventh president. Thousands and thousands of Individuals are thrilled by his comeback.
My honest hope is that those that didn’t vote for Mr. Trump will ultimately be satisfied that he suits the invoice. Little question he’ll ship on all his marketing campaign guarantees.
JoAnn Lee Frank
Clearwater, Fla.
To the Editor:
Hypocrisy is taking the identical oath of workplace you broke the final time with a straight face. Obliviousness is believing that this time shall be completely different.
Richard M. Frauenglass
Huntington, N.Y.
To the Editor:
America is again. No, it’s not that Donald Trump is once more president. It’s that the world witnessed an important and enduring a part of our democracy: President Biden shaking the hand of our new president, Mr. Trump, in a celebration of the peaceable transition of energy in presence of all of our residing former presidents.
In contrast to 4 years in the past, the world noticed that America is again.
William Goldman
Los Angeles
To the Editor:
Renaming the Gulf of Mexico because the Gulf of America would require the useless reprogramming of dozens of U.S. authorities web sites and the reprinting of 1000’s of presidency maps and charts.
A lot for Elon Musk’s Division of Authorities Effectivity.
Invoice Galvani
Bainbridge Island, Wash.
To the Editor:
Re “Saying No to Fear” (editorial, Jan. 19):
I saved your considerate and pitch-perfect editorial close by whereas watching the inauguration. It helped to have the ability to look away and reread your recommendation for a dose of sanity and calm. You highlighted the methods our establishments can “meet the second” by exhibiting braveness and utilizing their powers to withstand and override unlawful and unjust acts, and converse the reality whilst we expect deeply in regards to the anger and mistrust of many who voted for a second Trump presidency.
However the confluence of what was arguably essentially the most disturbing Inaugural Handle in our historical past on the very day on which we honor the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. — a person so completely different, in each respect, from the one who now could be our forty seventh president — helped me see that we should certainly stand robust and hold our religion within the system, not seek for our passports, if collectively we’re to bend the arc of the ethical universe towards justice.
Meredith Minkler
Kensington, Calif.
To the Editor:
Instituted in 1787 by the Structure, checks and balances have been to make sure the separation of powers among the many three branches of presidency. What the subsequent 4 years portend — rather than checks and balances — are toadying and cronyism.
Penelope Ross
Westport, Conn.
To the Editor:
In reply to the “soul-shriveling disgrace” a Jan. 15 letter author and so many people really feel as Individuals, and the despair, as our nation inaugurates a duly elected however convicted felon and amoral demagogue as president: Our moral response as residents should be sustained civic engagement.
Disgrace and despair, whereas applicable, by themselves are disempowering — as each demagogue is aware of. We should not stay disheartened by such feelings.
What the historic second now asks of us is righteous anger, highly effective hope and principled braveness to face collectively in civic motion by phrase and deed in opposition to each try to debase and degrade our political tradition and the establishments of democracy and legislation.
(Rev.) Sheldon W. Bennett
Quincy, Mass.
Biden’s Exit Pardons
To the Editor:
Re “Last-Hour Pardons Aimed at Averting Reprisals” (entrance web page, Jan. 21):
I’m glad to see that President Biden lastly did the correct factor in granting pre-emptive pardons to a few of these whom Donald Trump had threatened with legal prosecution. Unhappy to say, nevertheless, these pardons, whereas motivated by good intent, have been poorly executed.
To begin with, the record ought to have included, by identify, everybody Mr. Trump or his supporters had threatened. The place, for instance, was Jack Smith? This brave prosecutor is little doubt close to the highest of Mr. Trump’s revenge record.
Additionally, Senator Adam Schiff, a Democrat, and former Consultant Adam Kinzinger, a Republican, who have been each on the Jan. 6 committee, are publicly on document as not wanting pardons. Mr. Biden’s workforce ought to have requested all potential pardon recipients prematurely in the event that they actually would welcome the pardons.
Lastly, why wait till the eleventh hour to behave? Gen. Mark Milley and Anthony Fauci’s statements replicate their reduction and gratitude for the pardons. Huge-ranging pre-emptive pardons have been publicly debated for a lot of weeks.
Mr. Biden’s Hamlet-like delay on this set of pardons — ready till the final day of his presidential time period — little doubt precipitated these good folks pointless angst about whether or not they can be going through imminent legal prosecution.
Greg Schwed
New York
The author is a lawyer.
