USA TODAY

Letter to the editor:

The tirade of Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., about social media on USA TODAY, “We might be better off if Facebook, Instagram and Twitter vanished,” will go down as a moral panic for the ages. By suggesting that “we’d be better off if Facebook disappeared” because it is “a parasite” that might be encouraging a spike in suicides — even while admitting there’s no proven link — he really has gone overboard.

Politicians have castigated new technologies and platforms for corrupting the current generation. But youngsters are increasingly leaving Facebook and Twitter (if they bothered joining) because some view them as places where old people hang out.

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Hawley’s suggestion that social media doesn’t create value for workers or consumers ignores the fact that U.S. tech companies produce high-quality jobs and affordable, collaborative communications platforms that are popular across the globe. That’s an American success story.

We don’t need Washington politicians to decide which sites our families should use. If Hawley really believed that these sites are dangerous, he would lead by example and take down his social media accounts, which are still active. He seems far more addicted to these sites than kids are.

Adam Thierer, Mercatus Center; Arlington, Va.

Republicans are just enabling Trump

Letter to the editor:

Since Donald Trump was elected president, I have been appalled by the unwillingness of Republicans to stand up to him when he says and does things that run contrary to our sacred principles. This weekend we witnessed another shameful example of this cowardice — of how Republicans seem all too happy to place politics above country.

Normally, Republicans in Congress preach the importance of patriotism and rebuke all efforts to undermine it. Yet they refused to harshly condemn Trump, who on foreign soil sided with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, a ruthless despot and enemy of the U.S., in criticizing Joe Biden, a respected former American vice president — his political views notwithstanding. This rhetoric is unprecedented. No other president in history has behaved in such an un-American and unpatriotic manner.

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If a Democratic president had made such a statement on top of his other transgressions, Republicans would rightly clamor for impeachment — as would any reasonable person. Instead, Republicans remained silent. From a rhetorical perspective, this makes them enablers of Trump, and active participants in undermining our nation, its values and the presidency. The question remains: How can we get Republicans to do their job and protect the country?

Richard Cherwitz; Austin

The popular vote benefits rural America

Letter to the editor:

Of all the cockeyed myths being peddled by opponents of a national popular vote, one of the most outlandish is the notion that ensuring 270 electoral votes and the presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes nationwide would inflate the power of big cities and relegate rural America to permanent political “serfdom,” as Trent England stated in his USA TODAY column.

The simple fact is that the state-by-state, winner-take-all method of awarding electoral votes has already left rural America sitting on the political sidelines in presidential elections. The voices of rural voters are virtually extinguished because not all live in one of 12 closely divided battleground states.

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The power rural America would gain under a national popular vote is illustrated by the fact that President Donald Trump was elected on the shoulders of rural voters who flipped five battleground states — Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and North Carolina.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to reason that if winning the White House with 270 electoral votes depended on winning the national popular vote, candidates would be compelled to go after every vote in every state — urban, rural or suburban. A national popular vote is a constitutionally conservative, American idea whose time has come.

Patrick Rosenstiel, senior consultant for National Popular Vote; Los Altos, Calif.

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