Letters From the January 9/16, 2023, Issue

Letters From the January 9/16, 2023, Issue

Letters From the January 9/16, 2023, Issue

Here we go again… Unintended consequences… An American daughter… Dangerous policies…

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Here We Go Again

Re “Russia Hating,” by David Bromwich [November 14/21]: We are once more, in the name of democracy, supporting a leadership that suppresses dissent. Even worse, it prevents public workers from speaking Russian in Donetsk and Luhansk and ignores the history of the Azov Battalion and the assassination of questioning mayors. I am ashamed of my fellow progressives and a liberal media that almost unanimously censures all less-than-eager support of Ukraine as another multibillion dollars goes mostly to our own defense contractors. The publication of Bromwich’s critique of the media’s uncritical support for the war in Ukraine is the beginning, I hope, of a needed reappraisal of exactly what we are doing, again, in another war on the far side of the world. I hope The Nation leads the way.
Richard Boettger
key west, fla.

The writer served in the US Army Security Agency as a Russian-language specialist in the 1970s.

Unintended Consequences

Re “Scott Wiener’s Acid Test,” by John Semley [November 14/21]: I have no strong opinion about the drug laws California Senator Scott Wiener wants to reform, but I do hope he does not “focus squarely on ‘plant-based’ [or ‘natural’] psychedelics” in redrafting the decriminalization statute of SB 519, as Semley reports. Along with rare plants, wild-growing psychedelic fungi suffer from illegal harvesting compounded by climate change. The unintended consequences of keeping synthetics illegal while decriminalizing possession and use of psychedelic mushrooms will lead to further biodiversity loss and environmental degradation.
Naomi Miller
philadelphia

An American Daughter

I find most poems to be a struggle, but Cindy Juyoung Ok’s poem “Mama I Am Sorry” [November 14/21] is a masterpiece. We all fall short in sympathy for our parents and other people in our lives. Ok’s poem is a moving, heartbreaking work of self-realization.
Robert D. Pittack
caldwell, idaho

Dangerous Policies

I agree with Kai Bird that the US will not use tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine—nor should it consider it [“If Russia Goes Nuclear, October 31/November 7]. However, I couldn’t disagree more with his recommendation to support a compromise. Any compromise relieves Russia of accountability for its heinous behavior. It seems that the international community never learns the lessons of appeasement, genocide, and war atrocities against civilian populations.
Michael Valerio
miami

Putin has never threatened to use nuclear weapons and only repeated Russia’s no-first-use policy after the US State Department said that “all options” were on the table and Zelensky called for a preemptive strike. US policy contemplates first strikes to decapitate and counter force, and indeed NATO doctrine calls for first use. So yes, there’s more danger of nuclear war than ever, but it’s not from Russia. It’s from the US.
Ed Lowe

We can not back down

We now confront a second Trump presidency.

There’s not a moment to lose. We must harness our fears, our grief, and yes, our anger, to resist the dangerous policies Donald Trump will unleash on our country. We rededicate ourselves to our role as journalists and writers of principle and conscience.

Today, we also steel ourselves for the fight ahead. It will demand a fearless spirit, an informed mind, wise analysis, and humane resistance. We face the enactment of Project 2025, a far-right supreme court, political authoritarianism, increasing inequality and record homelessness, a looming climate crisis, and conflicts abroad. The Nation will expose and propose, nurture investigative reporting, and stand together as a community to keep hope and possibility alive. The Nation’s work will continue—as it has in good and not-so-good times—to develop alternative ideas and visions, to deepen our mission of truth-telling and deep reporting, and to further solidarity in a nation divided.

Armed with a remarkable 160 years of bold, independent journalism, our mandate today remains the same as when abolitionists first founded The Nation—to uphold the principles of democracy and freedom, serve as a beacon through the darkest days of resistance, and to envision and struggle for a brighter future.

The day is dark, the forces arrayed are tenacious, but as the late Nation editorial board member Toni Morrison wrote “No! This is precisely the time when artists go to work. There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.”

I urge you to stand with The Nation and donate today.

Onwards,

Katrina vanden Heuvel
Editorial Director and Publisher, The Nation

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