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The collapse of Route 22 linking low income workers in Idaho to jobs in affluent Jackson Hole, Wyoming (“Unclear how quickly Teton Pass road can be rebuilt”; June 10) may seem remote and irrelevant to Upper Valley residents. But it isn’t.
Infrastructure, like roads and bridges, is usually taken for granted, rather boring. We notice it only if there are too many potholes and if repairs, reconstruction and detours delay our travels. But when infrastructure collapses, as that road (or the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore) did, the loss can be devastating. We suddenly realize how important infrastructure is.
Democratic government is like infrastructure. Indeed, democracy is the infrastructure of this country. If it fails, we will suddenly realize we are in trouble. Mostly we take democracy for granted. We complain about rough places, dangerous curves, too much congestion (like traffic and immigration) caused by other people, and above all, the cost of regular maintenance. But if democracy collapses, like a road that gives way, we will suddenly realize how much we have lost.
Democracy will be on the ballot in November, including the right to vote conveniently in free and fair elections, a choice of candidates who are willing to accept the results win or lose, law and order competently administered by professionals, and the right to protest peacefully and disagree without fear of retribution. Your vote matters if you care to protect the basic American infrastructure of democratic government.
Phyllis Tilson Piotrow
New London
Crime is declining
Like a recent letter writer (“Biden has ruined America”; Forum, June 17), I am concerned about crime in this country.
According to the latest figures from the FBI, violent crime and property crime are down sharply this year, following similarly steep drops in violent crime and property crime in 2023. The FBI reports that, nationwide, the murder rate has dropped 26.4%, sexual assaults have dropped 25.7%, robbery is down 17.8% and property crime is down 15.1%. In Detroit, where Trump recently decried the “rampant crime” in that city, homicides have reached a 57-year low. Nationwide, crime is lower now than it was during the Trump Administration.
If your concern is the crime rate, the choice for president is easy. That’s why I’m supporting President Biden.
Charlie Buttrey
Thetford
Democrats need a reality check
Since Democrats are almost all bedwetting over polls showing Trump either beating Biden or breathing down his neck, it’s high time for a little cold-bath therapy on two simple points.
So long as Biden wins re-election, which requires only minimal sanity among the voting public, Trump and his MAGA allies have no means — legal or otherwise — to contest the victory. In 2000, their lawyers contested the results 63 times and got nowhere, even with a Supreme Court nominally controlled by Donald Trump.
So long as Biden remains commander in chief, all threat of civil war is farcical. No MAGA militia can be a match for the National Guard or the US Armed Forces.
The polls that keep everyone on edge can be easily rigged. Having conducted a number of telephone polls myself, I can tell you that they are typically done by phone between the hours of 6 and 8 p.m., when people are most likely to be home. But even during those hours, the chances of getting a live voice on the other end of the line are only about 1 in 20. So any group of voters who want to rig the polls just has to agree to babysit their phones from 5 to 8 and tell the caller how much they love candidate X and hate candidate Y.
Is it any wonder we keep getting baffled by the results?
James Heffernan
Hanover
Labor shortage explained
Can you guess what the following jobs have in common?
■ Bingo game caller
■ National Guard member
■ Marijuana dispensary clerk
■ Real estate appraiser
■ Bar owner
The answer is that under New Hampshire law, these jobs (among others) are off-limits to anyone recently convicted of a felony involving fraud.
In this state we don’t trust Donald Trump enough to let him run a charity bingo game, and we shouldn’t trust him with the most powerful job on Earth.
Jim Matthews
Hanover
Man likes dogs
Terror and delight. Heaven and damnation. Wounding and healing. Birth and death. Holocaust and Nakhba. Is there no pattern, neither control nor prediction?
We are a sadly faulted species. My Labradoodle and her friends are far kinder, safer and more respectful.
Robert Belenky
Hanover
