Readers’ comments: July 4, 2025

This has to stop
Dear editor:
This has to stop. This is not the America I grew up in. The snatching of people off the street by masked, unidentified thugs is not how a civilized society works. Stephen Miller, Donald Trump and their Republican enablers have gone far beyond what any reasonable human being could accept. These kinds of actions are designed to sow fear among law abiding, contributing members of our communities.
The frightening thing to me is the number of my neighbors who not only accept these actions, but condone them. I weep for our nation.
I was a registered Republican for 50 years, until 2016.
Richard Ede
Claremont

I will not ‘get over it’
Dear editor:
Recently Sen. Mitch McConnell remarked when told of the great unhappiness of the American people with the “big, beautiful bill” and its drastic cuts to Medicaid, “… but they’ll get over it.”
You’re wrong. They will not “get over it” when millions are thrown off their health care. They will not “get over it” when food security is cut for their families, when millions of their children go to bed with empty bellies. No! They will not “get over it.” When their rural hospitals are shut, hospitals that are often the second largest source of employment in many counties and patients forced to drive hundreds of extra miles to receive health care for their families.
I know personally the trauma for driving to a hospital in the middle of the night with an asthmatic child who could hardly breathe. Desperately praying all the time, “Keep breathing, keep breathing.” And I only had to drive 15 minutes to that emergency room. Imagine if that trip had taken several hours because my local hospital had been shuttered, closed due to the unfettered greed of the plutocrats pushing for obscene tax breaks for themselves.
No, Mr. McConnell, we will not “get over it.” I will not “get over it” for I have sworn a loyalty to a higher authority than an ignorant, self-absorbed felon. My loyalty is to one who cared for “the least of these.”
Come November next year we will remember with a vengeance the ones you and your cronies disparaged — left out, shoved out. We will hold the authors of this monstrosity accountable. We will bring our “thoughts and prayers” to the polls this November 2026.
John C. Forney
Claremont