“Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.” – Mark Twain

Jon Buss is now pretending to be a didn’t-earn-it (DEI) school teacher passing out grades on the current malpractice presidency (“I rank Trump’s first year a success,” published Jan. 14). I hesitate to dignify Buss’ propaganda but it would be irresponsible not to repudiate his nonsense. Buss’ opinions and outlook continue to be the same old hits: ill-informed dogma and hysteria.

Buss suffers from amnesia when it comes to this country’s efforts on immigration. A bipartisan immigration and border bill was hammered out in February 2024. Trump sabotaged the bill by ordering the Republicans to refuse to vote for it. Remember? This is just another example of how Trump could care less about Buss and this country.

Arguably, illegal immigration may be a policy problem but epidemic gun violence is the more severe problem in this country in terms of death, injury, trauma, and societal cost. Unchecked gun violence is the real threat to homeland security; not illegal immigrants. Children are being repeatedly shot and killed in their classrooms. People are being shot in houses of worship, at the mall, in their homes, on college campuses, ringing doorbells, and in the streets (e.g., Renee Good). True? What does Buss do? He characteristically shrugs his shoulders, blows smoke, misdirects, belly-aches; and he irrationally and hysterically scapegoats immigrants that happen to make him feel fearful of being replaced.

Trade deficits? Do you like your iPhone? Apple imports their popular iPhones in China. Why? American CEOs enjoy trade deficits because of lower costs for the company and higher profits. Everybody is happy: CEOs, investors and consumers who enjoy lower costs (presumably). I once listened to a CEO for a big-name earth-moving equipment company being interviewed on tax-payer funded NPR. This CEO was proud of the fact that he has his company’s machines built overseas. He argued that there weren’t enough qualified workers in America and if there were; most wouldn’t be able to pass a drug test. True story. Buss is misinformed. Oh, by the way, Apple common stock is down today. Buy!

According to the Williams Institute, 2.8 million Americans identify as transgender. This is 1% of the American population over 13 years of age. I’m typing slowly so Buss can understand: One percent of America (emphasis here). Why is Buss apopletic and having conniptions over a relatively small demographic? Bigotry. Fear. Threatened. Irrationality. Scapecoating. Typical MAGA-billy: afraid and fearful of women, people of color (especially accomplished, credentialed and educated), gays and transgender people.

I looked up the word “woke.” It’s a term used for awareness of social justice, bias, systemic inequalities, sexism and power imbalances. Why does Buss find wokeness deplorable? I’ll tell you why: Republicans and the MAGA cult hijacked and twisted the term and misuses it as a pejorative because wokeness is their kryptonite. Buss’ continued ignorance and misguided dogma is all the more reason to stay woke… when not sleeping.

Stanley McKie

Enumclaw