Demonstrators protest against the U.S. Supreme Court's overturning of Roe v Wade, outside a courthouse in Montreal on June 26.Christinne Muschi/The Globe and Mail
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Down south
Re The Remaking Of America’s Legal Landscape (June 24): The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that gun laws must pass the test of being consistent with past historical use. The Second Amendment was passed in 1791, when “arms” were basically six guns and muskets. The Henry rifle, the first lever-action rifle, was not invented until 1860.
Supreme Court Republicans, all basically originalists, want to return everything to its original state. So New York and other states should reword their laws to meet the Second Amendment’s originalist meaning. Therefore new laws should recognize the historical right to carry any “arms” which existed when the Second Amendment was approved.
The result, then, would be to make all modern weapons illegal. Just an idea.
Thomas Theall Peterborough, Ont.
With a decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, the conservative-dominated U.S. Supreme Court has positioned itself in opposition to majority opinion in the country. That is not a problem in principle: The U.S. Constitution, like the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, is meant to protect citizen’s freedoms from the will of passing majorities.
But what justifies the authority of such documents? Why are we so beholden to the opinions of a few men who lived long ago? Is there ever a point at which those principles are so out of line with the will of contemporary citizens that it begins to feel like a tyranny of the past?
Sascha Maicher Ottawa
Now that the male-dominated U.S. Supreme Court has made an almost prehistoric decision, I am left wondering what U.S. laws and decisions would be if only men could become pregnant?
Peter Froud FRCPC, Kingston
Next: The Emancipation Proclamation?
Dale Horwitz Toronto
Forget Orwell, this is positively Atwoodian. My message to our American sisters: “Nolite te bastardes carborundorum.”
Lauralee Morris Brampton, Ont.
Interference call
Re MPs Vote To Hold Hearing Into Political-interference Allegations (June 24): Justin Trudeau states that he still has confidence in RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki.
Those words may be the kiss of death for Ms. Lucki: Mr. Trudeau said the same words about a previous governor-general, who was forced to resign a few months after those utterances.
Rick Ryerson Toronto
Justin Trudeau insists that neither he, members of his cabinet nor RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki put any “undue influence or pressure” on Mounties investigating the Nova Scotia mass shooting to help advance Ottawa’s gun-control agenda. The keyword in the Prime Minister’s denial seems to be “undue.”
Undue is an adjective meaning “unwarranted or inappropriate because [it is] excessive or disproportionate.” So what exactly did the Prime Minister mean when he used the word “undue?” In this matter, we can only wonder.
Ken Cuthbertson Kingston
Re NCC Issues Warning On Climate Change Damage (June 24): Ottawa-Gatineau’s bridges, parks and roads are potentially not getting repairs until they reach “near-critical condition” because of rapid climate change. This story should have been on the front page. The one about a hearing on relatively minor accusations of political interference by the federal government? It could easily have been in the back of the paper.
Jeff Zuk Hamilton
Going up
Re CPPIB CEO Remains ‘Cautiously Optimistic’ Amid Economic Downturn (Report on Business, June 24): And I remain cautiously optimistic that pigs will fly.
Ron Freedman Toronto
Re How To Fight Inflation, And How Not To (Editorial, June 23): There is an assumption that domestic inflation is driven by excess demand, and thus higher interest rates will “moderate prices by lowering demand.” Reducing prices is not, I find, the intended outcome of lowering demand.
The intended outcome would be to increase unemployment – that is, to cause a recession – to prevent workers from demanding a wage hike similar to price increases. In other words, the intention is to avoid a wage-price spiral at a cost to workers.
Recent research suggests that the main source of today’s domestic inflation is producers’ pervasive exploitation of market power. In the United States and Canada, corporate profit reached record levels in 2021, with price hikes likely the main contributor.
Therefore, contrary to the conventional view, fighting today’s inflation might not be a job for the Bank of Canada. It might be time to start thinking outside the box.
Gustavo Indart Professor emeritus, department of economics, University of Toronto
Two tracks
Re Calling Code Blue For Canadian Health Care (June 21): Within Canadian medical education, there is an established pattern of bright medical students being advised to avoid family practice. Combine this with provincial systems that highly reward practitioners of specialized care, and it’s a wonder any students choose to practice family medicine.
Perhaps it is time to establish separate recruitment and training pathways for family and specialized medical education, with efficient bridging options that allow students and practitioners to grow their specialty options throughout their career. Fresh thinking for a better future.
Susan Yungblut Ottawa
All a dream?
Re Masking Up Creates Tension In Public Spaces (June 20): Really? Here’s a question from Malcolm Gladwell’s The Bomber Mafia: A Dream, a Temptation, and the Longest Night of the Second World War that I think clarifies what’s going on: “What happens to true believers when their convictions are confronted by reality?”
The true believers in The Bomber Mafia are men who, since the 1930s, have invested heavily in their belief that precision bombing of concentrated, critical infrastructure can shorten wars and make them more humane. Over and over, evidence is used to prove the conviction wrong. Yet whenever more evidence emerges that they are mistaken, these men do not give up – they “double down.”
What if the present tension is generated not by me and my mask, but by the doubling down of anti-maskers faced with persistent evidence (symbolized by my mask) that some of their beliefs about pandemics are probably wrong?
Lloyd Lovatt Edmonton
So sorry
Re How Sorry? (Letters, June 20): I agree with a letter-writer who points out that a good apology needs much more than “I’m sorry.”
To his list of requirements, I would insert as step three to “acknowledge the harms.” This conveys to the recipient of the apology that “I get it.”
Irwin Walker Hamilton
Letters to the Editor should be exclusive to The Globe and Mail. Include your name, address and daytime phone number. Try to keep letters to fewer than 150 words. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. To submit a letter by e-mail, click here: letters@globeandmail.com