Wrong kind of ‘fresh start’ for Trump administration

We can expect a brand-new fresh start with the Trump administration. His Cabinet appointments are like naming a middle-schooler to be a university president. Such a pick has experience in education.

— Suzanne Schettler, Ben Lomond

Trump will likely move US into dictatorship

Soon-to-be-president Donald Trump has threatened to quickly change the United States’ democracy into a dictatorship, as stated in his campaign and in so many other ways. One of his priorities is to evict from the United States all undocumented immigrants, including their families, some who have lived here for many years. Unfortunately, many of the guard-rails of our democracy to prevent this move were removed by this most recent election as well.

The United States is not the only developed country in the world today having a mass of desperate people at their borders who are fleeing other dictators, civil wars, crime and/or climate change which have made their home countries no longer liveable for them. This is nearly impossible to prevent as they will continue to come as they have no other place to go.

Dictatorships such as Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, etc., consist of approximately 50% of the world population. Our soon-to-be-president will almost certainly allow America to come under the control of the other dictatorships around the world.

— E. L. Roberson, Santa Cruz

Despite state’s issues, Newsom plays losing hand

The cry of secession and treason that was shouted by the Democrats after Jan. 6 has taken a new turn. Gavin Newsom has called a special session of the Legislature to ready the state for complete disregard of federal law and the Constitution of the United States. Here we go again, file the lawsuits, play the best losing hand you got but the law of the land trumps the vision of Gavin. The Golden Boy has done his best to drive out business, manufacturing and replace it with the highest paid hamburger flippers in the Union. Never mind that there is a direct correlation between homelessness and no jobs, we can spend our way out of that but when the immigration issue hits the flame it’s an all-out war against the federal government.

California has and will continue to suffer until someone enlightened with critical thinking takes over and starts leading from the front. Not from Florida, China or Washington D.C. but from Sacramento, with only visions of the statehouse and not the White House.

— Arnold L. Versaw Jr., Aptos

Are conservatives correct about wasteful spending?

I’m a moderate liberal saddened by the path America seems to be on. But I’m no hater, no fan of Trump or his MAGA crowd, but not anti-conservative. Most of us, no matter how we may disagree, respect integrity and sincerity whether liberal or conservative. We often agree with the other “side” on the many important overlapping issues.

I agree, for example, with the new administration’s ambition to cut wasteful spending, even if I dread to ponder how they may go about “cutting.” But I’m all for prudent, smart spending at home or by the government. They want to focus on nonprofits. I’m skeptical about their intentions, but I tend to agree that non-profits might be more accountable.

The nonprofit industry is a good one; many nonprofits do good work. But many strive to present themselves as altruistic, necessary, and well-intended when they may in fact be wasteful self-servers who spend generously on salaries, computers, offices, insurance, funding, PR, etc., and some seem reluctant to make available their financials. Do the “conservatives” have a point?

— Stephan Bare, Santa Cruz

OK, critics, why his vote for Trump was ‘reluctant’

In order to be conciliatory to critics of Trump in this column who recently wrote there is no justification for voting for him, I’m going to give several reasons I was reluctant to vote for Trump.

1. Louis DeJoy is still postmaster general of the worst service for late, lost and damaged mail. Someone bring more Joy to our land and fire him. 2. The thought of seeing Arnold Palmer naked makes me sick. 3. Crooks and crazy people are in every country.

If I hear Tramp rage about this immigration issue once more, I might punch a hole in the wall. Speaking of which, modern travel has a dozen ways to sneak over one.

— Bill Graham, Salinas