A26 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.TUESDAY, MARCH 1 , 2022LETTERS TO THE EDITOR[email protected]R
USSIAN PRESIDENT Vladimir
Putin’s nuclear threats in re-
cent days — warning of conse-
quences “never seen in your
entire history” and putting his nuclear
forces on alert — are tactics aimed to
frighten and intimidate. The United
States and its allies must meet Mr. Pu-
tin’s bluster with restraint and vigi-
lance. But beyond the rhetoric lies an
increasingly worrisome reality: Rus-
sia’s Ukraine assault has set back
nuclear arms control yet again, leaving
the world less safe.
The 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear
Forces ( INF) Treaty, the f irst t o eliminate
an entire class of nuclear weapons,
ended in 2019 with U.S. withdrawal over
alleged Russian violations. In 2020, the
United States withdrew from the Open
Skies Treaty, a confidence-building
agreement allowing the signatories to
conduct short-notice surveillance
flights over each other’s territories. The
New START strategic nuclear treaty
with Russia was extended by President
Biden, but it expires in four years.
With a “strategic stability” dialogue
underway with Moscow, there had been
hope for a revival of nuclear arms
negotiations, including a successorINF treaty; a broader agreement on
tactical or short-range nuclear weapons
that have never been covered by treaty;
new technologies such as hypersonic
glide vehicles and Russia’s development
of a nuclear-powered cruise missile. But
the strategic stability talks have now
been halted because of the situation in
Ukraine. Mr. Putin’s aggression means
that arms control negotiations won’t be
relaunched anytime soon. Moreover,
Alexander Lukashenko, the autocrat of
Belarus and Mr. Putin’s ally, has just
pushed through constitutional changes
renouncing the 1990s commitment to be
a non-nuclear state, thus giving Russia
the possibility to bring nuclear weapons
to Belarus, bordering NATO members
Poland, Lithuania and Latvia.
Without arms control negotiations,
there will be no opportunity to explore
an agreement with China, which has
refused to join talks about limiting its
nuclear weapons. China’s strategic am-
bitions are rising, as demonstrated in a
series of reports last year indicating a
tenfold increase in intercontinental bal-
listic missiles, if each silo spotted by
satellites is eventually filled. Getting
China to the table was always a long-
shot, but now it’s even longer.The Russian aggression against
Ukraine will most certainly change the
ongoing administration discussion over
Mr. Biden’s nuclear posture review, a
periodic reassessment of the role of
nuclear weapons in the nation’s overall
defense strategy. A missile defense re-
view is also underway. The Ukraine
misadventure will probably create pres-
sure for a more hawkish outcome to
both.
Mr. Putin’s war also casts a cloud over
arms control generally. In the end, such
agreements are useful to limit danger-
ous weapons in a verifiable, legally
binding treaty. But treaties and negotia-
tions depend on the political willpower
and trust of the parties involved, which
have now all but vanished in the case of
Russia. Would the U.S. Senate ratify any
treaty with Mr. Putin, given what has
happened in Ukraine? No.
Both Russia and the United States
maintain strategic nuclear weapons on
launch-ready alert, a relic of the Cold
War. But the risks of accident or miscal-
culation are not a relic and have not
gone away. Mr. Putin has committed an
act of utter folly by injecting reckless
nuclear weapons threats into the vola-
tile mix he has created in Ukraine.Mr. Putin’s nuclear threatsArms control is dangerously unfinished business.T
HE DISAGREEMENTS start
over the most mundane of mat-
ters. An argument over someone
texting in a movie theater; a
customer at the checkout in a grocery
store being jostled; a driver getting cut
off by another car. But then someone
pulls a gun and what could have —
should have — been resolved with a little
calm, and some plain common sense,
ends in needless tragedy. Fueling the
spiraling escalation of violence that has
made the United States a global outlier
in gun violence are laws that give license
to people to shoot first.
“Stand your ground” laws, which
allow individuals to use deadly force in
public as a first resort rather than a last,
came into vogue in the United States in
the early 2000 s and, according to a new
study, are linked to a rise in gun
homicides. Florida was a pioneer, enact-
ing in 2005 a measure that essentially
eliminated a citizen’s duty to retreat
before using deadly force if they “rea-
sonably believe” their lives are threat-
ened. S tand-your-ground w as a factor i nGeorge Zimmerman’s acquittal in the
2012 fatal shooting of unarmed teen-
ager Trayvon Martin. It was cited as a
reason the original prosecutor in the
Ahmaud Arbery case initially decided
not to bring charges against the three
men ultimately convicted of fatally
shooting Arbery. And it loomed over the
trial of a Florida man recently acquitted
for shooting to death a moviegoer with
whom he had quarreled about cell-
phone use.
Proponents of stand-your-ground
laws, put in place in some 20 states that
followed Florida’s lead, say the laws
enhance public safety by reducing barri-
ers that prevent people from exercising
their right to self-defense. They also
claim that such laws deter crime. But a
study published last week in JAMA Net-
work Open, a peer-reviewed medical
journal, found stand-your-ground laws
are associated with an 11 percent in-
crease in monthly homicide rates. That
monthly increase alone, the authors
wrote, is greater than total rates of
homicides in most Northern and West-ern European countries.
The authors of the study analyzed
23 states that enacted stand-your-
ground laws between 2000 and 2016,
and 18 states that did not have the laws
during the full study period, from 1999
to 2017. Their analysis found that stand-
your-ground laws could be linked to
700 additional homicides each year.
Most striking was the rise in Southern
states — Florida, Alabama, Georgia and
Louisiana — that were early adopters of
the laws.
T he study’s findings also echo a 2020
review by the Rand Corp. about strong
evidence linking stand-your-ground
laws with an increase in firearm homi-
cide rates.
No doubt other factors have contribut-
ed to an increase in gun violence, but
laws that encourage people to grab a gun
and shoot when they think they are being
threatened — rather than counting to 10,
walking away, calling 911 — are not an
effective means of self-protection. They
should be recognized as what they are: a
prelude to tragedy.‘Stand your ground’ doesn’t save livesIt leads to needless killing.Security number when casting a ballot,
which must match information in that
person’s voter record. The requirement
resulted in widespread confusion
among local election officials. Many
voters saw their application for an
absentee ballot rejected because their
ID numbers were not on file. Others who
were able to receive an absentee ballot
saw their vote rejected because they
didn’t see in the fine print on the ballot
that they had to include their ID num-
bers a second time.
The voter ID rules are not the only
measures that might depress voting in
the state. Republicans have also made
in-person voting more difficult, by
eliminating procedures that were put
in place during the coronavirus pan-demic in Democratic-leaning cities
such as Houston. They banned drive-
through voting and prohibited 24-hour
voting, which was particularly helpful
for low-income shift workers unable to
take time off to vote. And because these
measures affected mostly urban areas,
the overall effect could depress voting
among minorities.
Voting should not be this hard. But
last year, according to the Brennan
Center for Justice, nearly 20 states
passed 34 laws restricting access to
voting. Voter suppression is a sign of a
sick democracy. Texas is the first to show
the symptoms, but as primary season
gets underway, we will soon discover
how far and how deeply the infection
has spread across the country.The Feb. 24 Metro article “Virginia
heads for a budget showdown” highlight-
ed a debate within Virginia’s General
Assembly. The federal Ta x Cuts and Jobs
Act of 2017 limited itemized tax deduc-
tions and approximately doubled the
standard deduction. Studies have shown
that about 90 percent of filers now take
the standard deduction. Virginia’s income
tax is tied to the federal process. If a filer
takes the federal standard d eduction, then
a filer cannot itemize deductions in calcu-
lating the state tax.
Virginia did not increase its standard
deduction, so many filers are no longer
qualified to itemize, accruing a huge wind-
fall to the state. The state should bring its
individual income tax into conformity
with the federal tax by doubling the stan-
dard deduction. Some lawmakers, as de-
scribed in the article, have been arguing
over how best to spend these excess funds.
The truth is that a portion of this excess
should be rebated to the taxpayers and, as
argued above, the system changed to pre-
vent this largesse from occurring again.
Mark Kane, SterlingVirginia’s tax windfallRussia’s invasion of Ukraine might have
some positive unintended consequences,
despite all the tragic suffering. Western
Europe might redouble its commitment to
renewable energy to lessen dependence on
Russian oil and gas. This would not only be
a boon for the climate but also soak up
some of the global glut of savings that is
now sitting idle and suppressing economic
growth. Another winner might be Iran,
whose spare o il production capacity will be
welcome if Russian exports are con-
strained. T he odds for revival of the nuclear
deal, which is a precondition for freeing up
Iran exports, have never looked better.
In the United States, greater interna-
tional demand for our fossil fuels will un-
dercut the movement to take reducing
greenhouse gas emissions seriously. What
the climate gains from Europe it might lose
from the United States. So it goes.
Wars change history in huge and unpre-
dictable ways. The only sure thing is that
Russia’s decision to start a major land war
in Europe has opened a new chapter of
both risk and opportunity and blown away
the confident predictions of just a few days
ago like confetti.
Brad Swanson, ViennaUnintended consequencesRegarding the Feb. 24 news article
“Tex. governor calls for child-abuse inves-
tigations of transgender care”:
Te xas officials have decided that parents
who provide gender-affirming health care
to their transgender children are abusive
and should be reported to child protective
services. Though many are rightly out-
raged, those familiar with the child welfare
system are not surprised.
Vague definitions of abuse and neglect
open the door to state-approved discrimi-
nation. These laws have historically been
used to control Black and Native families,
and these parents live in constant fear that
their children could be removed. This is
because poverty is often conflated with
neglect or because racial stereotypes are
used as evidence of poor parenting. These
laws are weaponized to prevent parents
from supporting transgender children.
Though some child welfare officials and
educators said they will not follow this
guidance because it does not comply with
their interpretation of the laws, in other
parts of Te xas, it will be open season on
these vulnerable youths and their parents.
What’s happening in Te xas simply shines a
light on a much larger problem: Child
welfare laws invite discrimination and
have been used to regulate marginalized
communities. What is considered child
abuse or neglect should not vary by county
under the same state laws based on the
political ideologies of who is in charge.
Shanta Trivedi, Washington
The writer is the faculty director of the
University of Baltimore’s S ayra and Neil
Meyerhoff Center for Families, Children
and the Courts.No surprise in TexasRegarding the Feb. 22 news article “Co-
lombian court decriminalizes abortion,
adding to regional momentum”:
Women in Colombia are celebrating
the C olombian constitutional court’s deci-
sion to decriminalize abortion. The case,
brought by the feminist coalition Causa
Justa, hinged on the argument that abor-
tion is a health need and, as such, should
not be regulated by criminal law.
Feminist movements in Latin America
have been showing the world how to defy
and transform the most ingrained patriar-
chal rules that control women’s b odies. The
United States faces the most serious threat
to women’s right to bodily autonomy in
half a century, b ut countries such as Argen-
tina, Mexico and Colombia have moved
toward decriminalization in the past year
and a half. I hope that, at this moment of
deep uncertainty about the future of abor-
tion rights in the United States, we can
draw i nspiration from the feminist solidar-
ity across countries and regions to shift the
terms of the abortion debate away from
criminality and toward advancing the
right to bodily autonomy in health.
Giselle Carino, N ew York
The writer is chief e xecutive of
Fòs Feminista.Advancing women’s rightsABCDEFREDERICK J. RYAN JR., Publisher and Chief Executive OfficerABCDEAN INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPEREDITORIALSWHEN REPUBLICANS in Te x-
as passed measures last year
to make their already rigid
election laws even stricter,
they claimed their changes would im-
prove “election integrity.” In reality,
they were an obvious attempt to sub-
vert mail-in voting and other pro-
cedures that made in-person voting
easier.
Now, the seeds of voter suppression,
which have been planted by Republican-
led state legislatures across the nation,
are bearing fruit. In the past few days,
thousands of absentee voters in Te xas
have learned that their ballots have been
rejected due to their state’s new voter
ID requirements. Now, they must scram-
ble to make sure their vote will be
counted in their state’s primary elec-
tions, which take place Tuesday. Many
will surely be disenfranchised.
Some of Te xas’s most populous coun-
ties have seen rejection rates for absen-
tee ballots as high as about 30 percent
in recent days, almost entirely due to
the Republicans’ new requirements. In
Harris County alone, which includes
most of Houston, more than 10,000
absentee ballots were flagged for cor-
rection as of Feb. 26. For comparison,
Te xas rejected 8,304 ballots statewide
in 2020.
Rejection rates will certainly fall as
people correct information included in
their ballots, but every rejection repre-
sents a headache for a voter, who must
spend time and energy to rectify it.
Election officials fear many will not be
able to fix their ballots before the
deadline. For some, including people
who have disabilities, voting in person is
not an option.
This chaos was entirely predictable. It
is also unnecessary. Despite Republican
claims to the contrary, Texas saw no
major irregularities i n the 2020 e lection.
An audit conducted by the Te xas secre-
tary of state confirmed this.
Nevertheless, Republicans passed
measures requiring absentee voters to
submit their driver’s license number or
the last four digits of their SocialElection restrictions bear fruitVoting should not be nearly as hard as the GOP has made it in Texas.BRANDON BELL/GETTY IMAGESTexas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) at a “Get Out the Vote” event on Feb. 2 3 in Houston.News Editorial and opinion
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1301 K St. NW, Washington, D.C. 20071 (202) 334-6000pandemic) who, because of unaffordable
and ever-increasing out-of-pocket costs,
defer or avoid getting care and are thus
considered underinsured; and most of the
rest of us who worry about the affordability
of constantly increasing health-care costs.
Among all the world’s advanced na-
tions, we are the only one whose health
insurance system fails to cover everyone
or do so affordably. To see the most
efficient path to fixing this problem, one
need look no further than our Canadian
neighbors, whose single-payer system of
government-funded, privately delivered
health care ensures patients not only
have access to but also receive the care
they need without the financial worry
most Americans must endure.
Some 69 percent of Americans favor
single-payer Medicare-for-all. Now it is u p
to our elected officials to support real
health insurance reform and make
Dr. Farmer’s dream a reality here.
Jay D. Brock, Fredericksburg, Va.In his Feb. 23 Wednesday Opinion essay,
“Paul Farmer helped save the lives of mil-
lions,” John Green emphasized that Paul
Farmer, the physician-anthropologist who
devoted his life to improving health care
for poor people around the world, “was
deeply committed to the belief that all
human lives had dignity and that every
person deserves access to high-quality
health care.”
That worthy endeavor should extend to
the nearly 30 million Americans who lack
any health insurance; the 44 million of us
(and this estimate was from before theMake Dr. Farmer proudMICHAEL DE ADDER