The Electoral College, the Holocaust, and the John Birch Society
Former prisoners of Buchenwald concentration camp are pictured in the wooden bunks where they slept, in a still from "The U.S. and the Holocaust" on PBS. Credit: National Archives and Records Administration
Keep Electoral College just the way it is
The headline on a letter read, "Just do away with Electoral College" [Opinion, Sept. 30]. Absolutely not!
New York and California do not get to decide the national candidate for the entire country, and that is what will happen with the national popular vote. Hence, the Electoral College. That’s a basic fundamental concept. One vote per person is fine in local and state elections, but the vast majority of progressive liberals in those two states do not represent the preference of the vast majority of our democratic republic. The Electoral College protects us from the liberal flavor of the day. Heaven help us if this is abolished.
Jeanann Wallace, Little Neck
Students should view Holocaust series
I recently watched Ken Burns' "The U.S. and the Holocaust" six-hour series on PBS ["Burns' new film explores U.S. reaction to Holocaust," exploreLI, Sept. 16]. It was the most profound and powerful program about the effects of the Holocaust that I have seen in my 81 years, I think that it should be mandatory showing in every high school history or social studies class in the nation. As time goes on, I fear that the curriculum will put less and less emphasis on man's inhumanity to man, especially when more than 6 million people were murdered because they were "different." Educators, are you listening?
Howard Mandell, East Northport
A political reminder, several decades later
Three readers brought me back to my life in 1973-74 ["Birch society hasn't changed its stripes," Letters, Sept. 27]. I was a graduate college student writing my master's thesis, which I entitled "The John Birch Society -- More Dangerous Than Ever." This proves once again that the more things change, the more they remain the same.
Philip Martone, Mineola
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