Election time views on tariffs, migration, presidential qualities, women’s rights (Your Letters)

Editor’s note: The last day to submit a letter to the editor related to the 2024 election is Oct. 21, 2024.
To the Editor:
Donald Trump has a tariff plan that he claims will “Make America Great Again.” His plan is to raise tariffs (taxes on imported goods) 60% on Chinese products and 10% on goods from all other foreign nations. This is his plan to eliminate competition on U.S. goods and companies and bring prosperity to America.
Will it work? No! We tried that same trick almost 100 years ago with the Smoot-Hawley Tariff, which raised all tariffs (taxes on products made in other countries) 20%. The result was catastrophic! What these tariffs will do is raise prices, limit productivity and limit consumer choices.
The Smoot-Hawley Tariffs caused global trade to halt, leading to panic and runs on the banks, causing hundreds of bank failures, leading to the collapse of our money supply.
But that wasn’t the end. World governments collapsed, causing social unrest and the rise of racial, cultural and religious prejudice as people sought solutions to these awful problems by blaming others. In the 1930s, Far Right and nationalist extremists made their moves on those failing governments, using hate, fear and prejudice to take control of countries like Germany, Italy and Japan, and we ended up with World War II.
Today, Far Right extremists are endangering many European nations. Here in the United States we have Christian Nationalism taking hold of today’s Republican Party. We are all in danger of losing our democratic republics, and what the Trump Party will replace ours with is founded upon fear, rage, prejudice and division. If Trump succeeds here, we will lose our 250-year-old constitutional democracy and its promise of freedom of religion, press and choice. Is that what you want?
Remember that “those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it.”
Kathleen D’Amico
Cicero
To the Editor:
Although many of us have opinions about specific values and traditions, a central principle of our government is the neutrality of the courts. We need the court system to be impartial in order to be fair. This benefits everyone.
On Sept. 12, Attorney General Merrick Garland spoke out to forcefully protest attempts to make the Department of Justice a “political weapon.” He condemned efforts to intimidate career public servants who do their jobs preserving the law.
The website justice.gov/about has the department’s purpose posted front and center: “The mission of the Department of Justice is to uphold the rule of law, to keep our country safe, and to protect civil rights.”
If our government fails to hold lawbreakers accountable, regardless of their positions in society or politics, then laws will lose all meaning. Allies of former President Donald Trump, and Trump himself, have publicly suggested plans to dismantle this important aspect of our government. This is outrageous and dangerous.
We have a responsibility in this presidential election. We can choose a leader who respects the law and other citizens, or one who does not. Vice President Kamala Harris will defend our court system – and thus defend us.
Sandra Fentiman
Utica
To the Editor:
The Oct. 6, 2024, front-page article “Rep. Williams has changed messaging in election runup” reads as biased. I am a die-hard Democrat and couldn’t conceive of voting for the right based on their current positions on issues, and the insanity about which I see, hear and read. That said, the article presents a picture of Williams as disingenuous and pandering to public perception.
Although I agree with the article’s premise, this is only one side. It might have been best to discuss the facts on, for example, what percentage of times both candidates (Williams and John Mannion) “crossed the aisle” when sponsoring/co-sponsoring bills.
I have seen very balanced articles in the Post-Standard, and some less so. This one prompted my letter because, although it feels good for me to read, I think, paradoxically, that you would lose the readership of people who need to see the facts, which would be… all of us.
Karen Schwarz
Syracuse
Editor’s note: A story is upcoming that will examine state Sen. John Mannion’s record, part of the Post-Standard’s continuing coverage of both candidates.
To the Editor:
I was surprised but not shocked that recent letter writers linked Donald Trump to Project 2025. Voters are now in desperation mode and lying about Trump and I can only surmise that this must give them comfort and justification that Kamala Harris is a better choice. Let me remind you that she is a candidate that didn’t receive one vote to earn her the democratic right to be the candidate and we are all familiar with what happened to her candidacy in 2020.
I joined an estimated 67 million viewers who watched the Trump – Harris debate and heard Donald Trump disavow himself from Project 2025. So why would anyone think differently? Please review the Republican platform. Uneducated voters also promote the ridiculous argument that Trump would sign a national abortion ban into law. It’s the Halloween season and anything scary is the theme. What scares me is that people cast their votes on these lies, as evidenced by their letters and that people would make abortion the primary issue and actually cast a vote on the issue.
It is evident that voters for Harris are struggling to find a reason to vote for her, other than their dislike of Trump. Please remember the last time the Democrats nominated a far left candidate and the results.
I lived in Buffalo most of my adult life and there was a men’s clothing store that advertised that an educated consumer is our best customer. In the best interests of our country, I would promote the idea that an educated voter is our best citizen. Therefore, I suggest that you vote for the person with the best policies and perhaps not the best personality.
Michael P. Russo
Syracuse
To the Editor:
I returned this week from another volunteer trip to the U.S.-Mexico border, and the first thing I had the misfortune of reading in this publication is a comment from Rep. Brandon Williams about fentanyl and immigration. (“John Mannion, Brandon Williams spar over immigration in 2nd debate of House campaign,” Oct. 9, 2024)
It would be easy to say Williams doesn’t know what he’s talking about, but I’m sure he knows exactly what he’s saying — and that’s what makes it worse.
Williams surely knows of the many reports, including one by the right-leaning, libertarian Cato Institute, showing that the majority of people who smuggle fentanyl into the U.S. are U.S. citizens (89% of those convicted).
Despite what Williams says to foment fear of “the other,” fentanyl is not being smuggled into the country by desperate men, women and children risking their lives crossing the Rio Grande or the deadly deserts of Arizona or southern California.
It’s been well documented that the deadly drug is coming through official ports of entry, including San Ysidro, California, where 100,000 people cross the border every day. Drugs are hidden in wheel wells, dashboards, engine compartments, under containers of produce in trucks and other hiding places.
Williams also falls back on another lie, the tired “open borders” shtick that MAGAs use to blame President Joe Biden and, by extension, Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris for just about every problem known to man.
Williams knows full well that the border is anything but “open.” Biden has gone back on campaign promises and further restricted the legal right to asylum, leaving even more vulnerable people to suffer and die on our doorstep.
It may be a surprise to some, but the hard-core activists I work with at the border absolutely despise Biden and are not the least bit fond of Harris.
So please, Rep. Williams, stop with the fear-mongering about migrants and fentanyl.
As Adam Isacson, director of defense oversight for the Washington Office on Latin America said, “That is the mark of somebody who’s trying to get as much political advantage out of it even though 100,000 Americans a year are dying.”
Jim McKeever
Fayetteville
To the Editor:
Regarding Scott Miller’s letter, “Electoral College undermines 1 person, 1 vote” (Oct. 6, 2024, Post-Standard), I would like to rebut, point by point.
His assertion that the Electoral College was established “as a compromise for the slave states” is simply a regurgitation of well-worn political twisted history intended to push a political agenda of nationwide “one-person, one-vote” in our residential election. The Constitution established that Electors by state would elect the president. This means “one-person, one vote” is the law of the land, by state. This was the result of the “Great Compromise of 1787” among the 13 colonies. Some colonies wanted a countrywide popular vote and some colonies wanted Congress to elect the president. Underlying the disagreement was the big vs. small colony issue. The “Great Compromise” reached between large and small colonies is why each state has two senators (i.e., disproportionate representation), and why we have presidential voting by state (again, disproportionate representation via the Electoral College).

The “3/5 Rule” was primarily negotiated as it related to number of representatives in Congress for each state and taxation/budgetary considerations. The fact that it also affected the count of electors for each state was a result, but not the driving force of the 3/5 Rule. Slavery ended via the 13th Amendment and the 14th Amendment ended the 3/5 Rule and gave formerly enslaved men the right to vote. However, the Electoral College and resulting indirect and disproportionate election of the president continued, because slavery was not the underlying issue driving the Electoral College; large state v small state power was. Arguably, the 13 colonies would never have come together to form the United States if it were not for the “Great Compromise” and the resulting disproportionate representation. In other words, states’ rights and geography matters, and is encoded in the Constitution. Note also, that there is no political office in the U.S. that is decided by national popular vote; every political office is decided by states, because we are a nation of states and states’ rights provide more local autonomy, as agreed upon and enshrined in the Constitution.
Miller is concerned that the GOP majority denied President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, “ignoring the separation of powers.” On the contrary, the Senate did not ignore any separation of powers, and in fact, were exercising their separation of powers by denying the appointment. The Senate simply exercised its rights and power that it was entitled to. If the Democrats wanted things to turn out differently, they should have won control of the Senate in the previous election.
For the record, I haven’t voted for a Republican president in the past six presidential elections nor do I plan to in this upcoming election. I find it offensive when people twist our country’s history and political system to justify their politics.
Ross W. Stefano
Syracuse
To the Editor:
I feel the president of the United States needs to be someone who:
We have one candidate who was already given an opportunity as president. He not only botched the handling of Covid, he did not fix immigration (he did not even finish his wall). He did not believe in the rule of law; in fact, he thinks he is above it. He cozied up to dictators and alienated our allies. Now he is preaching lies again about our economy, immigration, the war in Ukraine and is stirring up fear in people. He literally stopped the bipartisan bill created to fix the immigration problems. He also wanted to stop them from passing the budget. Are these the actions of a leader?
Kim Vulcano
Syracuse
To the Editor:
Many ask, why vote for Kamala Harris? There are ample reasons why many women, especially those who lived through the 1960s and ’70s, are voting for Harris.
I clearly remember that being a woman back then meant she:
Do you want to go back to a time when a woman was not trusted to make a sensible, thought-filled decision? I most definitely do not!
I won’t accept anyone telling me I am incapable of making my own decision; I am a second-class citizen because I never had a child or that I need a man to protect me. Women are proud of who we are, our decisions and our achievements.
Join many of my friends and me in protecting freedoms for our women family members and for our future. Please vote for Harris/Walz and every other Democrat on the ballot this Nov. 5. As Kamala Harris says. “We are not going back.”
Regina Kekis
Rome
To the Editor:
Long before I was born in 1987, my mother worked valiantly to pass the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) to the U.S. Constitution. She was at the Illinois Capitol in 1982 when the legislature failed to ratify the amendment, effectively ending its chance of success at the national level.
And now here we are, more than 40 years later. The effort to amend the U.S. Constitution remains but many states, including New York, have taken matters into their own hands. This election, New York voters now have a chance to make our state’s ERA one of the most inclusive in the country — adding “ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, or sex” to the list of characteristics that are protected (a list that currently include “race, color, creed, or religion”) and for which discrimination is specifically illegal.
My mother is now a grandmother to one (soon to be two) girls. For all three of them and for every other resident of the state who would benefit from this amendment (which would be us all), I implore you to vote “yes” on Prop 1.
Katherine Bannor
Clinton
To the Editor:
Our current New York Constitution has a limited equal protection clause that only applies to those experiencing discrimination based on race, color, creed or religion. On the ballot this November is Proposition One, commonly known as the Equal Rights Amendment. It would expand those protections to include sex, gender, age, disability and ethnicity.
Before John Adams and our Founding Fathers were about to draft our country’s Constitution, Abigail Adams implored her husband to “Remember the ladies.” Instead, they drafted a document that said “All men are created equal,” and women have been fighting for equal rights ever since.
It’s time we honor our Founding Mothers and remember the ladies by flipping our ballots over and voting “yes” on Prop 1, giving every New Yorker the equal rights they so deserve.
Karen Savoca
Munnsville