June 9, 2025 Editor, The News-Gazette: The federal government doesn’t want to admit that hotter, more polluted oceans, cutting into our coastlines, is much to worry about; the president hasn’t sent a representative to international conference where experts are trying to deal with it. Meanwhile, the standards of workplace safety are weakened, people with low incomes may be out of luck if they need medical care, and, just lately, non-citizens, people who have been allowed to stay here because they have a justified fear of thugs back home, or of their tyrannical government, are losing protected status.
There is a lot more. Few of us can keep track of the changes in policy, or of the full reach of the damage they are causing. There is no clear pattern to most of these actions. Notice them for a moment in all their absurdity (such as reducing services in the national parks just as the summer season begins), and the response is instant laughter. Think them over for a minute or so, realize how much harm is being done, and the laughter is followed by loathing. Call that the laughterloathing syndrome.
Now reflect on the frequent, dangerous, unexplained and inconsistent features of federal decisions in this administration. Call them RAUKS: Random Acts of Unkindness. PHILIP F. O’MARA Lexington
