Trump, the new Ralph Nader

It’s time the GOP did something about its Trump predicament | Column, Nov. 17

Move over Ralph Nader. You will no longer be the king of presidential election spoilers. There’s new royalty in town, and former President Donald Trump will take that crown and continue to destroy the GOP is a much more glorious fashion than what Nader did to the Democrats a generation ago. I suggest every MAGAGA (Make America great and glorious again) give all their money to the Trump campaign and not give a nickel to the rest of the party. For once, the Trumpian dumpster fire is solely in the Republicans’ court. I’ll bring the marshmallows.

Brian Walkowiak, Saint Petersburg

Noonan has a lot to learn

Maybe Republicans will finally learn | Column, Nov. 14

Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan has a lot to learn about Gov. Ron DeSantis. She writes that politics “...is all about us.” Not to DeSantis, it isn’t. First, I think it’s all about him. Second, it’s all about his movement, all others unwilling to swallow their “medicine” be damned, and third — there is no third. He has sworn an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution five or six times in his adult life, only to spin around and, and I believe, attack and subvert that Constitution in his public life, whether it was being complicit in Donald Trump’s efforts to press state legislatures to send fraudulent electors to Washington on Jan. 6, or his companion assignment to the Florida attorney general to join a bogus, bad faith Texas lawsuit attacking millions of votes in four other states. Let’s not forget as he slouches his way toward Washington.

Steve Douglas, St. Petersburg

Mapping out victory

Did DeSantis’ map deliver the U.S. House to Republicans? It’s complicated. | Nov. 17

Gov. Ron DeSantis threw out the Florida Legislature’s maps of voting districts in favor of his own gerrymandered maps. That is not the will of the people. I think it is called “rigging” elections. Just more of DeSantis doing as he pleases.

L.J. Phillips, Brooksville

America has changed

Are we deeply divided? Or just poorly represented? | Column, Sept. 8

America has disappeared. But on closer examination, it seems to be changing in composition and tactics. More diversified, yet more issue-focused, makes it harder to identify, vilify and defeat. Why has this change occurred? Because America has changed.

For better or worse, we have become that multicultural and diverse country that liberals have worked to achieve for at least a century. It’s almost impossible to get a simple majority to agree on the simplest issue. True knowledge and wisdom are possessed by so few people that, to use it when dealing with the general public, is pointless.

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Though sad, it’s almost amusing to hear someone cite the U.S. Constitution in support of, or in opposition to any legislation. No one, not even the Supreme Court or the president, feels any need to obey it. The rule of law has become whatever the enforcing authority decides it to be at the moment.

Will there be a series of declarations of independence, as the several states rebel? (Better save those battle flags.) There’s a lot of shaking going on and, without a crystal ball, it’s anybody’s guess how it will turn out.

Bill Strickland, Dade City

Measuring political performance

What a DeSantis victory means | Editorial, Nov. 13

I am wary of hasty interpretations of election results. After 2020, there was the unfortunate denial of the outcome for president. However, too few Republicans also failed to observe that Donald Trump’s negative down ballot effects were even more pronounced. I am tempted to concur with the Times Editorial Board’s view that Gov. Ron DeSantis had a good night on Nov. 8, while Trump had a bad one.

I cannot, however, concur with the editorial board’s interpretation that the landslide by Republicans in Florida represents a red victory in the culture wars. In some states those issues were more prominent and likely determinant. More often, though, the electorate responds to performance. This better explains why many Democrat incumbents in other states held onto their seats and why several Republican gubernatorial candidates greatly outperformed Republican candidates for the U.S. Senate and House.

People and companies are moving to Florida in great numbers and voting registrations have shifted. I find in these and the election outcome evidence that a strong majority believe that most things work a bit better in Florida than elsewhere. Emphasizing the ideological over the practical appears to project value preferences unduly. That many voted those kitchen table issues, after all, seems more likely.

Pat Byrne, Largo