To the Editor:
Re “Special Counsel Report Says Trump Would Have Been Convicted in Election Case” (nytimes.com, Jan. 14):
The special counsel Jack Smith’s report reveals a perfect storm of systemic failure. The Supreme Court’s expansion of presidential immunity and outdated Justice Department policies have made overwhelming evidence irrelevant — because the accused regained power.
This isn’t just about one man. Together, these legal gaps have created a dangerous blueprint for future autocrats: Undermine democracy, then win office to evade accountability. The founders never imagined that their safeguards would be twisted into tools of impunity, protecting those who attack the system they swore to uphold.
The choice before us is stark: Reform these fatal flaws — by limiting immunity, prosecuting election interference and reassessing Justice Department policies — or accept a nation where power trumps justice.
Donald Trump didn’t just evade accountability; he showed how fragile it has become.
Jordan Ryan
Decatur, Ga.
To the Editor:
Early on in his clear, bone-dry and chilling report that documents Donald Trump’s desperate attempts to stay in the White House after losing the 2020 presidential election, the special counsel Jack Smith states: “Mr. Trump then engaged in an unprecedented criminal effort to overturn the legitimate results of the election in order to retain power.”
Like the once and future president’s behavior, the report is shocking, but not surprising: We’ve known most of the details as a result of Mr. Trump’s second impeachment, the investigation by the House Jan. 6 committee, the dogged work of outstanding journalists and, most impressively, the truth-telling by two groups of Republicans who have subsequently faced unrelenting scorn and many threats: those who served on Donald Trump’s staff during those fateful days (e.g., Cassidy Hutchinson) along with scores of elected Republicans from all over the country (e.g., Rusty Bowers).
I encourage everyone to read this document. Doing so honors the many people whose definition of citizenship we should emulate in the difficult days that may be coming.
Mark Keller
Portland, Ore.
To the Editor:
With Jan. 20 fast approaching and the idea of a convicted felon taking up occupancy in the White House a looming reality, I feel a deep sense of soul-shriveling shame in my identity as an American.
Can anyone help me deal with this crippling emotion so that I can get back to being a functional citizen of this august land again?
To the Editor:
Re “Historians Take a Misguided Stand on Gaza,” by Pamela Paul (column, Jan. 10):
Ms. Paul’s excellent piece about the American Historical Association’s recent passage (though not final) of a counterproductive and biased resolution accusing Israel of “scholasticide” — essentially, the “intentional destruction” of Gaza’s educational system — while ignoring the root causes of Israel’s war with Hamas highlights a growing trend we are seeing in academia and the broader society. This is the perverse, all-or-nothing game of blaming Israel for everything while ignoring inconvenient and incontrovertible truths.
It might be instructive to remind these historians that this all started with the terrorist attack on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas gunmen attacked Israel, massacred about 1,200 men, women and children in their homes and at a music festival, and took about 250 others as hostages in Gaza. Then, as thousands of rockets rained down on Israeli civilian areas for months from the Gaza Strip, the Hamas leadership all but refused to negotiate a cease-fire or a return of hostages.
One might also note that the Hamas leadership hardly has the education of its populace as a priority. The group is notorious for using hospitals and schools to hide weapons and terrorists and has spent the past decade pouring most of its financial resources into building up an infrastructure of tunnels and a huge arsenal.
Unless it is teaching future generations the finer points of antisemitism, hatred of Israel and in some cases how to use violence, the education of the children of Gaza is mostly an afterthought — if it is thought of at all.
Historical revisionism and denialism are tactics long embraced by Palestinian leaders. But they shouldn’t be the province of historians and scholarly academics, who must teach an unvarnished version of history grounded in critical inquiry and the acceptance of basic facts.
Jonathan A. Greenblatt
New York
The writer is the C.E.O. and the national director of the Anti-Defamation League.
To the Editor:
I am a historian, a member of the American Historical Association and someone who voted in favor of the resolution at our annual meeting calling for a cease-fire and condemning Israel’s obliteration of Gaza’s educational system. Pamela Paul claims that the vote is “counterproductive.”
Of course, our action is symbolic. We seek to halt the U.S. financial and diplomatic support that enables Israeli warplanes to continue destroying the remnants of Gaza’s schools, libraries and archives — and killing its people. We want our resolution to help build a movement among our fellow citizens — the majority of whom, polls show, share our concern about Gaza — to press Washington to do the right thing.
But we are not just virtue signaling. Our archival research as historians often reveals what past leaders concealed from their publics. We have learned, for example, that the political dissent on American campuses over the Vietnam War, like teach-ins and other forms of protest, was more instrumental than previously known in persuading Richard Nixon to withdraw U.S. combat forces from a conflict that history has judged tragically mistaken.
As scholars and teachers, we cannot remain silent in the face of inhumane policies that future historians will condemn.
Ellen Schrecker
New York
‘Pleasing’ Is Not the Proper Word
To the Editor:
Re “The Steep Financial Cost of ‘People Pleasing’” (Business, Dec. 30):
This article raises awareness about the downside of so-called people pleasing. I frequently hear my female patients use this term to describe themselves. The problem is that the term disguises what is really happening, confusing a costly behavior that is often driven by anxiety and fear of conflict with a positive altruistic trait.
Continuing to use this language can actually encourage the unhealthy behavior. Who wouldn’t want to be seen as someone who pleases others? But if you call it “emotional prostitution,” for example, or “subordinating yourself” people begin to feel appropriate inner conflict.
I believe that being more intentional with the language we use, and encouraging curiosity about what we are actually saying, is the first step to changing people’s behavior.
Lynn Margolies
Newton, Mass.
The writer is a clinical psychologist.
Democrats’ Fortunes
To the Editor:
The Democrats, no doubt, suffered a stinging defeat. It has led to much hand-wringing and apocalyptic commentary.
I am old enough for sure to remember Barry Goldwater’s humiliating defeat in 1964, and I remember reading about predictions of the end of the Republican Party.
But history intervened, the Vietnam War escalated, and Richard Nixon won in 1968 and was resoundingly re-elected in 1972.
Yes, the Democrats have to really rethink some things and lessen their obsession with certain issues, but the obituaries should wait.
Francis Quinn
Port Washington, N.Y.
