Opinion: Partisan Top 10 lists and the sad state of political discourse in America

To the editor: And there you have it, in all its purple prose, in the top-10 year-end lists provided by one conservative writer and one liberal, the state of political discourse on both sides of the divide in our country today. (“Sean Davis: The top 10 undercovered news stories of 2017,” and “Adam Johnson: The top 10 undercovered news stories of 2017,” Opinion, Dec. 28)

Rhetoric, hyperbole, attitude and political partisanship, with little or no attempt at balanced assessment, consideration of context or often conflicting facts or real priorities impacting each complex situation. Just close your ears and eyes, and shout louder and more often than the other guy.

To use possibly the only accurate sound-bite ever to come out of President Trump’s mouth, “Sad!”

Peter Vincent, Los Angeles

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To the editor: In his list, Sean Davis misleadingly claims that “Russian collusion” charges were a dud and reiterates a number of politically motivated accusations against the Obama administration and the FBI.

There is already a lot of evidence pointing to collusion. Four Trump campaign associates have already been charged with or pleaded guilty to crimes related to Russia, which intervened in the 2016 election.

Numerous Trump associates had previously undisclosed meetings with Russians. There is even an email chain showing that Donald Trump Jr. agreed to meet with a Russian attorney after he received an email offering him damaging information about Hillary Clinton.

Unlike the growing evidence against Trump associates, there is no evidence that President Obama was spying on Trump. Accusations to the contrary from a known liar who claimed that Obama wasn’t born in America cannot be taken seriously.

Given that so many Republicans stood by as a retroactively registered foreign agent led a chant of “lock her up” at the party’s 2016 convention and ignored Trump’s admiration of Russian President Vladimir Putin, we shouldn’t be surprised that some of them are now working to undermine the rule of law through politically motivated attacks.

David Bendall, Aliso Viejo

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To the editor: I loved these op-ed articles. Here’s another important undercovered story: the growth of the bipartisan Climate Solutions Caucus in Congress.

Thirty-one Democrats and 31 Republicans have joined this caucus and already taken action on the climate crisis: They helped defeat an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act that would have nixed a study on the impacts of climate change on the military.

As wild weather events continue, other members of Congress will surely enter the caucus under its Noah’s ark rule: Bring a member of the opposite party with you.

Can a revenue-neutral carbon fee, which would cut greenhouse gas emissions quickly without growing the government, be far behind?

Kathy Seal, Santa Monica

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