I am writing to follow up on the article regarding the proposed Meriden Library, in which I was quoted as referring to it as “a project of convenience” (“Plainfield Divided on New Library,” Jan. 17). I attended the meeting to express sticker shock at the $1 million price tag — with up to half of that on the tax rolls — for the proposed library, given that our town already provides taxpayers with the Philip Read Memorial Library in Plainfield Village. The only thing this library lacks is a presence in Meriden Village.
In seeking a compromise, I was encouraging proponents of a one-library town (not an unreasonable view for a town of 2,400 in an increasingly digital age) to support some public funds out of respect for the convenience, history and sense of community brought by a library in Meriden Village. I asked supporters of the Meriden proposal to bear in mind they are asking other taxpayers to pony up tax dollars to avoid a drive others make (albeit in reverse) on a routine basis — sometimes multiple times a day — to do business at the town offices, attend any town or school hearings or public meetings, serve on any town or school committees or attend any school-related function. If Plainfield became a one-library town, this would be the single town service that would require a drive to Plainfield Village. Are there any proposed features that could be dropped to reduce the $1 million price tag, or if not, are there prospects for additional private funding?
I see folks in town, some longtime Plainfield residents, struggling to pay the tax dollars now required to stay here. I appreciate the services that make Plainfield such a terrific town to live in. Can we keep seeking common ground as we head into Town Meeting?
Susan Williams
Plainfield
Two recent letters to the Forum appear to point out some of our problems in Washington. A letter from Willem Post (“Look at the Democrats Who Wanted a Wall,” Jan. 17) nicely clarifies the past position of key Democrats once in support of a wall. One might ask why they have changed their minds. The obvious answer is: politics. If President Donald Trump wants it, they don’t.
A letter from Jim Baum (“Time for Congress to Govern,” Jan. 22) points out that the immigration problem has been kicked down the road by both parties for a long time. Though President Trump may be taking too tough a position, he is clearly trying to solve this problem for the good of the country.
It is time for well-paid members of Congress to grow up and to sit down face to face to negotiate a resolution of this issue instead of playing petty politics with our country.
Edwin Childs
Norwich
Warnings abound. The books and articles that bespeak the threat to democracy are many — books like How Democracies Die, One Nation After Trump, The Fifth Risk; articles like “The Suffocation of Democracy” and “The Threat of Tribalism.”
Critics of the Trump administration and Congress decry the demagoguery of President Donald Trump and the passivity of Congress. They claim that Trump is wreaking havoc on the democratic process by enhancing tribal politics, increasing the trend toward plutocracy, intensifying the racial divide, undercutting political norms, denigrating the press. We are warned that democracy is at risk.
How will we respond? Survivors of the 2011 “super outbreak” of tornadoes in Alabama and Mississippi and elsewhere were warned about the potential destruction but believed that “if it’s never happened here, it never will.” Are we likely to have the same response to democracy’s potential demise? The expectation that democracy in the U.S. could become an autocracy and subverted by a demagogue is difficult for many to believe. We are exceptional. How could it happen to us?
I think these threats are real. Examples include the continued concentration of wealth and power among the rich, limitation of freedoms embedded in the Bill of Rights, destabilization of the civil service, Trump’s disregard of norms that govern nepotism, conflicts of interest and the legitimacy of elections, denigration of the press, tribal politics with voters deeply divided by race, religious belief, geography, and even way of life.
Future threats might be Trump continuing to be a serial norm breaker, the explosion of cable news and social media (which will diminish the power of traditional gatekeepers), secret efforts to repeal and formulate legislation, increasing homogenization of our population, and decline of our system of checks and balances in favor of an autocratic president.
We need to assertively challenge Trump as demagogue. We should heed Alexander Hamilton’s warning in the Federalist Papers: “(O)f those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people, commencing demagogues, and ending tyrants.”
Bob Scobie
West Lebanon
I was struck by The Washington Post review by Michael Dirda of A German Officer in Occupied Paris, the World War II journal of Ernst Jünger, an officer in the German army stationed in Paris during the war (“A Controversial German War Hero,” Jan. 20).
Dirda’s review says Jünger’s political view “was distinctly right wing,” but “he resisted the era’s virulent anti-Semitism.” Here is a direct quote from the journal dated July 18, 1942: “Jews were arrested here yesterday for deportation. Parents were separated from their children and wailing could be heard in the streets.” Later, Jünger learns about the Jews’ fate in the camps but, according to the review, “doesn’t risk taking a public stand against Kniebolo, his journal’s code-name for Hitler. However, he does privately criticize the generals who give in to the Führer and his demonic inner circle, those sycophantic ‘courtiers in the realm of darkness’ among whom ‘the defamation of one’s enemy is a cult.’ ”
Sound familiar?
Gail Wild
Newport
After giving President Donald Trump’s demand for a border wall considerable thought, I’ve come up with an idea that would not only give him his stupid wall but also help our environment at the same time. Why don’t we truck all the empty plastic bottles to the border and glue them together, one on top of the other. Presto: a beautiful, see-through wall.
John Lanza
Sharon