To the Editor:
Re “Jury Says Trump Owes $83 Million” (entrance web page, Jan. 27):
The large damages award offers the right ammunition for Donald Trump to play the grievance card to his base and even past. The free publicity triggered by Mr. Trump ranting in opposition to the system (“This isn’t America”) fuels the MAGA message.
On the finish of the day, Mr. Trump could also be a internet winner from this whole defamation episode. Unabashedly, Mr. Trump raises funds off what he calls this “ridiculous” consequence.
We battle to know Mr. Trump’s enchantment, simply as we battle to understand that the E. Jean Carroll award can be steamrolled right into a victory for Mr. Trump. Whether or not this method can win a normal election is in play.
David S. Kasdan
Cortlandt Manor, N.Y.
To the Editor:
Re “Carroll Guarantees to Do ‘One thing Good’ With a Fortune Gained From Trump” (nytimes.com, Jan. 27):
It’s fantastic that E. Jean Carroll plans to do “one thing good” with the $83 million Donald Trump has been ordered to pay her for his merciless and persevering with defamatory conduct.
I humbly counsel that Ms. Carroll take into account supporting organizations that combat to increase or eradicate the handfuls of archaic, arbitrary and predator-friendly statutes of limitations throughout the US that forestall victims of sexual violence from in search of justice in court docket in opposition to their perpetrators and, in lots of circumstances, the employers that employed and helped them.
In any case, it was one such reform measure in New York — the 2022 Grownup Survivors Act — that quickly suspended the inflexible deadline blocking older circumstances and enabling Ms. Carroll and different wounded survivors to file civil lawsuits in opposition to particular person and institutional wrongdoers.
Adam Horowitz
Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
The author is an lawyer who represents victims of sexual violence.
To the Editor:
The current verdict for E. Jean Carroll is purpose for celebration for ladies who’ve been the victims of sexual assault and bullying by males — together with me.
However there’s one other facet of this case with which I establish — Ms. Carroll’s freelance writing profession. As a former freelance author, I used to be nicely conscious of her well-liked and witty recommendation column for Elle. Our paths briefly crossed after I utilized to be a part of a actuality present she was attempting to launch. She was pretty and gracious in our electronic mail exchanges.
Ms. Carroll has mentioned that her judgment winnings will go to good use, and I’ve little question that she’s going to discover a worthy group, maybe for rape and assault victims, to donate to. Not like Donald Trump, Ms. Carroll has lived frugally and is a sort and beneficiant individual. In distinction, The Occasions reported that Mr. Trump paid $2 million to eight charities as a part of a settlement during which he admitted to misusing the funds raised by the Donald J. Trump Basis to advertise his presidential bid and to repay enterprise money owed.
It’s clear to me, and I hope to those that are usually not within the thrall of a cult of character, that the very best individual has gained.
Jodie Gould
New York
To the Editor:
When Donald Trump whines on social media that “our Authorized System is uncontrolled,” he means, in fact, that it’s out of his management — a darn good factor, in the event you ask me.
Let’s simply hope it stays that manner.
Louise Guinther
Queens
Mr. President, Converse Plainly
To the Editor:
Re “Time to Conquer Hell,” by Maureen Dowd (column, Jan. 7):
Ms. Dowd is true in stating that President Biden has to “press his personal case and never depend on the media or Trump’s fatuousness.” He additionally must be simpler when he does so.
His speechwriters have to steer his speeches away from grand platitudes and rhetorical prospers and extra towards plain talking. Inform folks merely and clearly what they may lose if Donald Trump is again in energy — what rights, freedoms and authorities packages can be endangered or misplaced if he and his authorities of loyalists are calling the photographs.
We might simply lose primary freedoms like the precise to say no matter we wish about our authorities. Much less regulation means we might return to a time when giant corporations might make merchandise which can be harmful and polluters are free to poison our air and water. We might return to a time when well being care is now not out there to hundreds of thousands, when homosexual individuals are now not free to marry the individual they love.
“We by no means bow, we by no means bend” — which Ms. Dowd quotes from Mr. Biden’s Jan. 5 speech — is a lovely sentiment, however to most individuals it means nothing. We’d like President Biden to be clear about his accomplishments and concerning the concrete risks of extra Donald Trump.
Karin Kramer Baldwin
Petaluma, Calif.
Public Well being Questions
To the Editor:
Re “Public Well being Officers Can’t Danger the Public’s Religion,” by Pamela Paul (column, Jan. 19):
Ms. Paul blames public well being officers who urged Covid lockdowns for inflicting unanticipated harms, similar to delaying studying amongst schoolchildren. However actually blue states that, given the big uncertainty and concern brought on by the pandemic, extra totally instituted lockdowns and vaccine mandates additionally suffered proportionately far fewer Covid deaths and thus much less lengthy Covid incapacity. Such variations stay even when adjusting for variations associated to poverty, age of the inhabitants and different components.
If all states had the charges of a blue state like New Hampshire, over half one million People wouldn’t have died. The query will not be whether or not Covid prevention delayed studying (it did), however whether or not that delay was price saving half one million People’ lives.
Bioethics argues that all dangers and advantages — each social and medical — should be thought-about, not just a few. Such components could also be laborious to stability, however ought to humble us earlier than we too readily assign blame after the actual fact.
Robert Klitzman
New York
The author, a psychiatrist, is a professor on the Mailman Faculty of Public Well being and director of the bioethics masters program at Columbia College. He’s the creator of “The Ethics Police?: The Wrestle to Make Human Analysis Protected.”
Vocational Schooling
To the Editor:
Re “Excessive Colleges Will Present Job Coaching for Hospitals” (information article, Jan. 18):
Vocational schooling is lastly getting the popularity it deserves. For too lengthy, younger folks have been warned that and not using a four-year diploma their future was bleak. In consequence, many took on debt solely to belatedly discover that they might have been much better off getting into the work pressure with a highschool diploma and an apprenticeship.
Walt Gardner
Los Angeles
The author taught for 28 years within the Los Angeles Unified Faculty District.
