Letters: Time to rein in billionaires’ influence

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It’s time to rein inbillionaires’ influence

Think about it: The biggest problem with our government is the massive amount of political influence by a minority of very wealthy and powerful entities.

We can’t trust a government heavily influenced by a relatively small number of insanely wealthy individuals supporting both parties.

Donald Trump is right about one thing: The system is rigged, and he offered something different. However, his solution is another group of billionaires. That’s not what we need.

We need a level playing field for we the people. It’s time to rein in all this influence money in our elections. Call it what it is: bribery. It’s out of control.

Jay OwenCastro Valley

DOGE cuts takinghammer to our future

Children are the country’s future. Kids can’t help how much money their parents make. Let’s ensure that children have at least the bare minimum they need to grow up healthy (a place to live, enough food to eat, basic medical care and public education).

Between executive orders and the work of DOGE, huge cuts are occurring at many federal agencies and programs. Donald Trump recently proposed cutting housing funding (HUD) by $6 billion. That will throw a lot of families out of housing. Tell Trump and Congress not to hurt kids by cutting housing and medical care.

Ashley CoatesMoraga

Biden’s legal path toborder security blocked

Re: “Securing the border wasn’t hard after all” (Page A6, Feb. 27).

In the Feb. 27 opinion column by March A. Thiessen, the author states that Joe Biden failed border security, but Trump won.

He failed to say that Biden attempted to act by legal legislative means through a bipartisan bill that was several months in the making but was blocked by Trumpublicans in Congress who wanted to block any border action until Trump was president. Trump used an executive order, which may or may not be found legal.

Biden attempted to act by law, Trump by thuggery. There is nothing admirable about Trumpublicans’ actions; it’s just another erosion of our legal protections.

Patricia CoffeyOrinda

Trump administrationis without compassion

Re: “House GOP must now turn budget ideas into a reality” (Page A3, Feb. 27).

There is a stench emanating from Congress that is so overwhelming, so enveloping that it sickens the stomach, the heart, the soul.

Over the Congress presides a malevolent husk of a human being. Every action, every thought is seen through the squeezing lens of money. The poor and the sick are to be deprived of sustenance and of care so that the unquenchable avarice of the few can pile high their already obscene wealth. President Trump and acolyte Elon Musk stand atop this pyramid of pelf, spinning the lie that it is just to reduce medical care for those at the bottom to provide tax cuts for those at the top. On the backs of the unfortunate they sit, fanning themselves with pious platitudes.

Is there no compassion, no concern, no limit to their desire to destroy the values that once made America a great nation? No. A tyrannical plutocracy is ordained.

James HammillWalnut Creek

Is the U.S. systemon its deathbed?

Re: “Trump sets stage for surge of layoffs and position cuts” (Page A3, Feb. 27).

We are witnessing unconscionable fraud, waste and abuse. Fraud is being perpetrated by Donald Trump and his unelected co-president, Elon Musk. Waste is the work that is not getting done in Washington as Musk willy-nilly plays financial dictator. The abuse is god-awful pain being caused to tens of thousands of government workers and their families, as well as the suffering inflicted on fellow human beings in the poorest places on earth.

To me, we are witnessing unconscionable events. They are beyond the tenets of all major human faiths that believe in love of neighbor. They are grossly un-American. Meanwhile, the pundit class jawbones over fleas on the posterior of politics while we face the biggest question that is not being asked aloud: Is America, and that for which it stands, on its deathbed?

Shame on us.

Tom DebleyWalnut Creek