To the Editor:
Re “Trump Allies Are Winning War Over Disinformation” (front page, March 17):
The U.S. Supreme Court put limits on free speech, saying you can’t falsely shout “fire” in a crowded theater. Fundamental to our democracy is an informed electorate. Yet our courts seem to be OK with a flood of lies and propaganda masquerading as news and aimed at burning down our democracy.
This should concern every American for several reasons, including the surge of social media sites that contain much misinformation, the closure of many local newspapers, a decline in the number of real journalists, and an increase in the amount of misinformation spread by adversaries like Russia and China in an attempt to affect the outcome of our elections.
Richard Dickinson
Richmond Hill, Ga.
To the Editor:
In the same way that semiautomatic guns and bump stocks were never foreseen by the founding fathers when establishing the Second Amendment, social media and A.I. escaped their prescience when it came to issues of free speech.
The commerce of ideas as they addressed it consisted primarily of public discourse via the printed or spoken word at social, political and religious gatherings. The idea that citizens would someday own portable electronic devices that facilitated both the easy manufacture and distribution of subjective realities certainly surpassed anything imagined in the Sedition Act.
America must now address two pressing questions that Madison, Hamilton and others were spared. How do we prevent the yelling of “fire” in a crowded theater when there is neither an actual theater nor an assembled crowd? And how do we stop domestic and foreign profiteers who would embrace the resultant turmoil?
Anthony Nannetti
Philadelphia
To the Editor:
There is a difference between supporting the First Amendment and hiding behind it. A presidential campaign that uses disinformation to subvert a fair and legal election is undermining the very democracy for which free speech is a bulwark.
Louis Greenstein
Pleasantville, N.J.
To the Editor:
A Supreme Court decision preventing the Biden administration from deciding what can and cannot be said on social media would also prevent a potential future Trump administration from deciding what can and cannot be said on social media.
Ronald J. DeFelice
Irvine, Calif.
Senator Ted Cruz Responds
To the Editor:
Re “An Islamophobic Smear Campaign Is Dividing Democrats,” by Lydia Polgreen (column, March 21):
Ms. Polgreen blames Islamophobia for Adeel Abdullah Mangi’s difficulty in getting confirmed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, and she accuses me of conducting “bad faith ambushes” because I asked Mr. Mangi during a Senate Judiciary hearing if he condemns Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel.
The reason I asked Mr. Mangi this question — which Ms. Polgreen fails to mention — is that Mr. Mangi has refused to denounce statements by the director of Rutgers’s Law School Center for Security, Race and Rights in which the director referred to Israel as an “occupying force” and accused Israel of engaging in “settler colonialism.” Mr. Mangi donated to the center and served for years on its board of advisers.
Ms. Polgreen also fails to note that the Senate confirmed another nominee, Zahid Quraishi, who, like Mr. Mangi, is Muslim and Pakistani American, with 81 votes — one of the highest vote totals for any judicial nominee of the Biden presidency.
The White House and Senate Democrats don’t want to defend Mr. Mangi on the merits of his record, so they instead accuse his critics of Islamophobia. That is a shameful attack.
Ted Cruz
Houston
The writer is a Republican senator from Texas.
Talking to Children About Cancer
To the Editor:
Re “How to Talk to Children About Cancer,” by Talya Minsberg (Live, nytimes.com, March 22):
We were saddened to learn that Catherine, Princess of Wales, has been diagnosed with cancer. Our thoughts as therapists immediately turned to her children and the challenge of having difficult conversations. We agree with Ms. Minsberg’s recommendations.
No one can provide better care than a parent as their child experiences emotional trials. Illness is inevitable, and caring for a child through a family illness is an inevitable part of parenting. This affects the parent, too, but they can be most effective in helping a child by attending to their own feelings first; then they can fully focus on their child’s needs.
We believe that being honest with a child is always best. Tell the truth, but only the amount that a child can hear and digest at any given moment. Take the lead from what a child asks, making sure the tone and the answer align with where a child is. This conversation is an ongoing one that will be elaborated on over time.
We believe that the best antidote to the fear and pain of loss is togetherness. As Catherine said: “Please do not lose faith or hope. You are not alone.”
Elena Lister
Michael Schwartzman
New York
The writers, a psychiatrist and a psychologist, respectively, are co-authors of “Giving Hope: Conversations With Children About Illness, Death and Loss.”
Why We Keep Our Landlines
To the Editor:
Re “Speaking Out for Landlines in Digital Age” (front page, March 17):
My wife and I are on the high side of 65, and we pay for a landline only as a lifeline as we deal with the never-ending onslaught of power outages wrought by National Grid in Massachusetts, some as long as 10 days in our years here.
We also live in a mobile phone dead zone. So our mobile phones must depend on internet Wi-Fi for all calls. When the electricity goes out, so does the internet, hence our lifeline to the outside world in times of crisis.
We plug in two touch-tone phones to replace cordless phones when there is no juice from National Grid. Whether AT&T, Verizon and others like it or not, plain old telephone service (POTS) is as close to 100 percent reliable as you can get. But now they want to tear out the copper, forcing us to unreliable telephone service.
Ben Myers
Harvard, Mass.
To the Editor:
You’ll have to pry my landline phone from my cold, dead hands.
I find it absolutely ridiculous and user-unfriendly to hold a screen to my ear, as well as to then hold the phone back where I can see the screen in order to find the keypad, while missing the spoken conversation.
Claire Albahae
Brewster, N.Y.
Internet Access
To the Editor:
Re “Millions Are Set to Lose Internet Access Subsidies” (news article, March 24):
During our history, Americans brought mail service, electrification and telephone service to all corners of the country. Why the lessons learned from these experiences can’t be used to solve the challenge of similarly providing residential internet access coast to coast as well is a damning indictment of our broken national politics.
Gary Rucinski
Newton, Mass.