To the Editor:
Re “O Canada, Come Join Us,” by Ross Douthat (column, Jan. 12):
Pricey Mr. Douthat,
We learn your invitation to affix the American household, and whereas we’re flattered, we should politely decline.
Consider us Canadians as your favourite cousin who loves poutine over burgers and well being care over havoc. We cherish our pleasant rivalry, like beating you at hockey, however residing collectively? Maybe not.
You recommend we abandon our quaint customs like common well being care, beneficiant parental go away and that cute little factor we name gun management. And as a lot as we love visiting your stunning bustling cities, we like our community-focused, syrup-sweet life-style much more.
We’re a modest bunch, albeit a bit smug about our politeness and the way we handle to embrace everybody, from each nook of the globe. Our mosaic is colourful, our winters are white and our hearts — without end purple with maple leaf satisfaction.
So, whereas we admire the familial invite, consider us because the kinfolk who love household reunions however desire their very own residence afterward. In any case, somebody has to maintain the rink lights on.
Be happy to go to Canada anytime, Mr. Douthat — no have to convey a casserole, simply an open thoughts and possibly a hockey stick.
Richard Wright
Hong Kong
The author is a Canadian creator residing in Hong Kong.
To the Editor:
Oh, sure, Canada, do be part of us! We may absolutely use your civility down this manner. Bear in mind, although, that the value of admittance to our republic has turn into moderately steep.
You need to pledge fealty — publicly, abjectly — to our incoming pricey chief. You need to abandon all pretense of honesty, which is greatest completed by repeating the identical lie at each public discussion board. You have to be wantonly merciless to immigrants and deal with them like barbarian pet eaters. You need to make nearness to energy your all-consuming quest.
Greater than the rest, you could look the opposite approach! No matter your training, nonetheless densely layered your syntax, you could by no means acknowledge the world you’ll be ushering in by your silence.
Mark Jacoby
Cherryfield, Maine
To the Editor:
As a Canadian, I’m gobsmacked that an American — Ross Douthat — would confuse widespread dissatisfaction with a federal authorities with a want to fold up all the nation with the intention to merge with one other. By that measure, shouldn’t you could have been knocking on our door to turn into our eleventh province years in the past?
Brief-term frustrations apart, we’re high-quality, thanks.
Anthony Wilson-Smith
Toronto
To the Editor:
Regardless of the lengths that Ross Douthat goes to offer his bona fides as a scion of Canada, his essay is a stark instance of one of many United States’ most distinguished social and cultural exports: important character syndrome. Why wouldn’t Canadians wish to “take part within the nice drama” and assist “form the imperium”? The higher query is, Why would we?
So we are able to pay extra for much less accessible well being care? So we might be saddled with extra training debt? So we might be beholden to extra monopolies, with fewer protections? So we are able to have even fewer political choices?
Perhaps as a substitute of preening within the mirror, take a look round you. The “shining metropolis on a hill” is collapsing, and we are able to hear you arguing about who’s value saving from up right here. Considered from the surface, the “nice drama” of America is extra “Actual Housewives” than “West Wing,” and shaping the imperium clearly has a billion-dollar minimal buy-in.
Dave MacLachlan
Halifax, Nova Scotia
James Carville Is Nonetheless Mistaken
To the Editor:
Re “Why I Was Wrong About the 2024 Election,” by James Carville (Opinion visitor essay, Jan. 6):
Mr. Carville continues to be improper. He sees all the things by the prism of the Nineteen Nineties Clinton years. This election was not some complicated thriller that Mr. Carville needed to ponder, looking for hidden truths. It was purely in regards to the candidates, and about underlying racism and sexism.
The roles experiences had been nice, fuel costs are down, the inventory market was booming and inflation was reducing. None of that basically mattered to voters it doesn’t matter what they could have stated in exit polls. I imagine that the overwhelming majority of Trump voters wouldn’t vote for Kamala Harris or anybody like her below any circumstances. No quantity of political messaging can change fundamental human nature.
Donald Trump appealed to the worst in us, and virtually half of voters fell for it. Sadly, we should face the fact that a big portion of American voters harbor a substantial amount of racism, sexism and xenophobia.
Nathan P. Carter
Winter Park, Fla.
To the Editor:
James Carville writes, “Denouncing different People or their chief as miscreants is just not going to win elections.” Sadly, it appeared to work fairly nicely for Donald Trump.
Jeremy Pressman
West Hartford, Conn.
Serving to the Hurting
To the Editor:
Re “When Grief Comes to Your Mailbox” (Opinion visitor essay, Jan. 5):
Sloane Crosley writes in regards to the onslaught of letters she obtained after she wrote in regards to the suicide of a good friend. She did her greatest to reply, though, as she put it, “On prime of not being a grief counselor or somebody a fan of duties, I’ve an allergy to earnestness.”
I could also be too earnest. When my first e book, “Girltalk: All of the Stuff Your Sister By no means Instructed You,” got here out, I used to be 28 and completely unprepared for all of the reader mail about despair, problems and stepfathers who entered bedrooms. However I wrote everybody again, hundreds of handwritten letters. I didn’t see how I may do in any other case.
E mail made correspondence simpler, and the web has given ladies extra locations to share emotions and search info. However I nonetheless obtain letters and nonetheless write again. I do know that sort phrases are a robust balm.
Ms. Crosley explains that many people “refuse” arduous conversations as a result of we worry “less-than-perfect articulation” of turmoil or condolences.
True. However when somebody is hurting, saying one thing beats staying quiet. Even simply texting “Pondering of you” lets the opposite particular person really feel your affection and put a coronary heart on it. If you happen to can say extra (you, not A.I.), higher nonetheless. Whenever you present you care, less-than-perfect phrases add mild to darkness.
Carol Weston
Armonk, N.Y.
The author is an recommendation columnist at Ladies’ Life.
Why I Don’t Fly
To the Editor:
I applaud “Green Air Travel Is Still a Fantasy,” by Mark Miodownik (Opinion visitor essay, Jan. 2).
Once I inform individuals whom I do know to be in any other case involved about local weather change that I’ve, for years, not indulged my love of journey by jet transportation due to its extraordinarily disproportionate and damaging influence on the surroundings, they stare at me as if I’ve two heads or sheepishly look away.
Sadly, for many, the journey bug trumps the looming menace of environmental collapse, underscoring the boundaries of most individuals’s willingness to sacrifice their self-enjoyment whatever the environmental prices or to behave as shoppers by flight boycotts to power modifications within the dangerously polluting aviation trade.
Mark Bierman
Brooklyn
