Letters

I, too, am tired of Ed Surgan pontificating about the virtues of Donald Trump [“More Trump Or Not,” Letters, January 30]. Donald Trump is a liar, a cheat and a bully. The evidence of his abhorrent behavior is voluminous. I will not indulge your readers with the thousands of lies he has told, or his overt threats to career diplomats if they dare to expose his wrongdoings. Only if you have an open mind will you even entertain these facts.

Let’s move on to the end of democracy as we know it. When U.S. Senate Republican members refuse to call witnesses and subpoena documents to ascertain the truth, the fix is in. We have just taken one step closer to a dictatorship.

Everyone naively thinks it can’t ever happen in America; I say, just look around you.

There is no disputing that Trump made the constitutionally appropriated aid to Ukraine contingent on President Volodymyr Zelensky making a public announcement about an investigation into his political rival Joe Biden. However you wish to rationalize those facts, they are indisputable.

The president’s defense could not defend his actions. Instead, they argued that the president can do anything he wants (including breaking the law) as long as, in his mind, his reelection is in the best interests of the people. Wow, that sure sounds like the logic of a dictator.

Where are we now in America, and, more importantly, where do we go from here?

Today is a sad day for America, and I mourn what we have lost. Hundreds of thousands of Americans have been killed or maimed in the name of democracy throughout our history. For what? To see a fixed, partisan trial with no relevant witnesses or documents to expose the truth, in order to protect the worst president in the history of our country?

Unfortunately, many of the Trump supporters, regardless of what we learn he did and how pervasive the cover-up was throughout his administration, never will admit he did anything wrong. They will concoct some rationalization or justification for his actions. We all know that Trump said, “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I would not lose any votes.”

It appears you are one of them.

By the time this article is published, Trump will have been exonerated by Senate Republicans. We will see Trump strut in the acknowledgment that he did nothing wrong. It was a “witch hunt.” Look what they tried to do to me. You must rally around me to fight off all this fake news. It is so predictable it is disgusting.

The question remains: Where do we go from here?

Michael Alestra

East Quogue