14 The EconomistJanuary27th 2018Letters are welcome and should be
addressed to the Editor at
The Economist, The Adelphi Building,
1-11 John Adam Street,
London WC2N 6HT
E-mail: [email protected]
More letters are available at:
Economist.com/lettersUnhappy anniversaryI fundamentally disagree with
the conclusion of your leader
reviewing Donald Trump’s
first year in office. You let him
off too lightly (“One year old”,
January 13th). The critical point
comes in the final line of your
argument: “He and his admin-
istration need to be held prop-
erly to account for what they
actually do.” Yet you reject
what you describe as an
“obsession” of Mr Trump’s
opponents with his character,
and suggest that his lack of
principles actually creates an
opportunity for making deals.
In a country still torn by
racial divisions, Mr Trump’s
comments after Charlottesville
matter a great deal. In a coun-
try whose constitution en-
shrines free speech, labelling
the press as “the enemy of the
people” matters a great deal.
Blatant disregard for the truth
matters a great deal, as does
encouraging violence by the
police. The list goes on and is
as long as your arm.
You are wrong to imply that
calling attention to this type of
behaviour is frivolous. Democ-
racy and its institutions are
fragile and precious. The
presidency matters more,
domestically and overseas,
than the simple tally of
legislative achievements. All
democratically elected leaders
should be held to account for
their character, their honesty
and their effect on the fabric of
their nations. As the leader of
the free world, America’s
president should be held to the
highest standards of all.
In some ways, your argu-
ments demonstrate the extent
to which our society has been
anaesthetised by Mr Trump
and his kind. Many of those
who hold him to account for
his ethics and his words do so
not “as an exercise in wish
fulfilment” to remove him
from office but because they
have a grasp of the magnitude
of the issues facingthe United
States, a love of their country
and a belief that integrity,
morality and character are
important. The president’s
weak character and dishones-
ty contribute greatly to the
erosion of trust in democraticinstitutions, an ever-increasing
partisanship, greater social
divisions and the consequen-
tial breakdown in the ability of
society to find solutions to
pressing problems.
JONATHAN TURNER
San FranciscoShame on you. Your blinding
desire to highlight the liberal
left makes you write articles,
such as your piece on Mr
Trump’s first year, that are
incorrect and totally inaccu-
rate. Liberals (Democrats) need
to learn how to lose. You’ll be
back in power one day and
you’ll have your chance once
more. For the time being, let Mr
Trump do his job. His potential
mistakes may give you abun-
dant ammunition to demon-
strate that he is wrong, but let
the guy prove you right. Be
good losers and remember
that the country comes before
any political ideology.
ANDY VAN WALLEGHEM
Cypress, TexasMarginalised communitiesIt was very welcome to see a
thoughtful article on the dire
situation of Gypsies and
Travellers in Britain who find
themselves newly ineligible to
apply for an authorised
encampment (“No place to
roam”, January 13th). The most
unjust effect, however, is on
the most vulnerable—those
who cannot travel for reasons
of ill-health or extreme old
age—and who now cannot rely
on any national planning
advice of the sort which used
to enable them to continue to
live within the Gypsy and
Traveller ethnic way of life.
I should add that ethnicity
has been legally established, in
the case of Romani Gypsies
(Commission for Racial Equali-
tyvDutton, 1989) and Irish
Travellers (O’Leary v Allied
Domecq, 2000), which is why
they should be spelt with
capitals G and T. You wouldn’t
want to write “jews” or
“sikhs”, would you?
JANET WHITAKER
Co-chair
All-Party Parliamentary Group
for Gypsies, Travellers and Roma
House of Lords
LondonSingaporean values“Rules are thicker than blood”
(January 13th) derided Singa-
pore’s norms on what consti-
tutes a family as “Victorian”.
Our values and social norms
on what makes for a stable
family unit are conservative
and shape the government’s
policies and ruleson adoption.
They differ from today’s West-
ern norms, which are histori-
cally recent and by no means
uncontested, even in Western
societies. Singaporeans will
determine their own pace of
any change in family values.
A push for rapid social
change, especially on conten-
tious moral issues, risks polar-
ising society and producing
unintended results. In Singa-
pore nearly all children are
born and raised in wedlock,
starkly different from what
now happens in the West. We
make no claim to know which
values are best for every
society. The Economistmay
think Singapore is quaint and
old-fashioned, but time will
tell if a cautious approach to
social change is wiser.
FOO CHI HSIA
High commissioner for
Singapore
LondonTerminal declineThe main issue thatprevents
America’s airports from pro-
viding the best possible pas-
senger experience is a woeful-
ly understaffed Customs and
Border Protection agency
(“Departure gates of hell”,
January 6th). To ensure greater
efficiency and security, air-
ports, including Miami Inter-
national, have called for in-
creases in CBPfront-line staff,
for which Congress needs to
provide the funding. CBPhas
for years faced a shortage of
thousands of officers across all
our air, land and sea ports. This
is a problem that will only get
worse when enhanced border-
security measures further
delay the traffictransiting
through these ports.
KEVIN BURKE
President and CEO
Airports Council International,
North America
Washington, DCSay what you like about Wash-
ington Dulles, JFKand Miami,
but you left out one American
airport that has managed to
earn the wrath of both Donald
Trump and Joe Biden: LaGuar-
dia. Both men have said travel-
ling through LaGuardia is like
being in the “third world”.
MIKE GALLAGHER
Doha, QatarNo list of the world’s worst
airports is complete without a
special mention for certain
terminals at Paris Charles de
Gaulle. In these Houses of
Dread, the ratio of border
officials to passengers is some-
times one to a thousand. Pick-
pockets and hustlers zero in on
you under the sight of un-
concerned policemen. Taxi
drivers insult you copiously if
you want to pay by card. The
airport’s Wi-Fi gives you an
advance taste of escargots.
ROMAIN POIROT-LELLIG
ParisI nominate Atlanta. It has the
longest queues and most
bolshie officials, even by
American standards. When
my feisty French wife
expressed concern at missing
our transit flight, the gentle-
man replied, “Lady, at this
point your only concern is: am
I going to allow you into my
country or not?” My British
passport full of visas to Russia,
Qatar and so on, required an
explanation for each stamp.
Yes we missed our flight. And
they lost our luggage.
DAVID LING
Eguisheim, France 7Letters
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