Readers Write: Russia-Ukraine war, nursing, self-driving cars, the Vikings

Opinion editor’s note: Strib Voices publishes letters from readers online and in print each day. To contribute, click here.

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To President Donald Trump: You have made a historically ghastly decision in the position you’ve taken vis-à-vis Russia’s naked aggression toward Ukraine and its war crimes there. You have abandoned a brave and freedom-loving people and chosen to abet the murderous Russian President Vladimir Putin in his continuing war crimes and attempts to subjugate a neighbor state. The positive things you have achieved (and there are some) will be eclipsed by your heartless and cowardly abandonment of the Ukrainian people. When Putin succeeds, more aggression will certainly follow, and you will rightly be seen as having failed to prevent it. When judged by history your ballroom will be likened to Nero’s fiddle and you an American version of Neville Chamberlain.

Mark J. Hanlon, Bismarck, N.D.

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It is no secret that Trump longs for the Nobel Peace Prize. In his quest for that honor, he is holding a gun to Ukraine’s head. His offer would have Russia guarantee the security and stability of the country on condition that it give up major territories.

It should be noted that Ukraine has been here before. In the 1994 Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances, Ukraine, at that time a major nuclear power, surrendered its nuclear arsenal to Russia in return for the promise that Russia would guarantee not to use threat or use of force against Ukraine’s territory or political independence and that it would respect the sovereignty and existing borders of Ukraine.

Larry Risser, Minneapolis

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It is to America’s great shame that Trump is so enamored of Putin that he has favored Russia over and over again in Ukraine truce/peace agreement proposals, again at a considerable sacrifice to the strength of the West and its capability to resist Russian intrusions, incursions and invasions.

Trump’s demands for Ukraine to cave on his latest proposal is another case in point. Fairness means more than just acknowledging Russian gains on the ground. It means greater assurance for the future. It’s OK to exclude Ukraine from NATO, as Putin most fervently desires (the threat of which provided some of the rationale for his full-scale invasion), because nobody in their right mind wants to die in an atomic war over Ukraine in which NATO is obligated to participate (i.e., when Russia attacks again and Ukraine fights back and Russia decides to go nuclear).

But there are better alternatives than giving away the store to Putin. The best is to arm Ukraine to the teeth — including nonatomic weapons that can reach farther into Russia — and to consider greater support for an air force. Only then there will be real deterrence. But doing that may require not just $100 billion from Russian assets for rebuilding Ukraine, but another $100 billion for rearming Ukraine.

Probably I’ve forgotten a few things. But it surely seems like Trump and his negotiators are too busy trying to coerce Ukraine and not busy enough pursuing a fair agreement that both sides can live with, however unsatisfactorily.

Jeffrey W. Koon, St. Paul

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Thanks to Ken Burns and PBS for trying to teach history to America. It seems the average American’s notion of history is limited to ”what happened to me last week.” As a result we’ve elected a government that defunds PBS and gives us Chamberlain’s appeasement policy for Russia, Herbert Hoover’s tariff policy, “flat earth” public health and energy policies, and a domestic policy from the wrong side of the Iron Curtain.

As is said: Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

Fifty years ago, I received a grant from the Nixon administration to get a master’s degree in nursing. I became a nurse practitioner and started a home health agency that served people with disabilities in over half the counties in Minnesota. I went on to work as a manager at the Minnesota Department of Human Services where I was tasked with revamping the state’s home health care delivery system. One of the innovations I introduced was telemedicine. It was met with skepticism and criticism, but two decades later with COVID, telemedicine became ubiquitous.

The Trump administration has announced that nursing is no longer classified as a profession, so it can limit federal student loans. Not only will the population of bedside nurses dwindle, but health care research and clinical innovation will also dissipate. This is penny-wise and pound-foolish.

Holly Branch, Edina

Google’s autonomous car company Waymo is going to start testing its cars in Minneapolis (“Driverless ride-share Waymo coming to Mpls.,” Nov. 21). If a Waymo gets in a crash or kills someone, who is liable for those injuries? Can we litigate effectively against a megacorporation that will either pin culpability on a remote-control driver in a third-world country or make the case that autonomous robots can’t be prosecuted?

This is also a slap in the face to the working-class drivers who are already under immense pressure from Uber and Lyft. Waymo is going to claim that its cars will be saving everyone money by sidestepping the cost of drivers — but it’s just funneling transportation money away from working Minnesotans, out of the state, into Google’s pocket. It’s going to use the standard tech playbook: offer low prices for consumers until all the previous competition dies out, and then creep the prices back up to original prices or higher, because it’ll be the only game in town.

Alana Hawley, St. Paul

The headline on Monday’s sports page, “Vikings lurch to new lows,” is incorrect and an insult to those of us old enough to remember 1984.

They’re bad. But they have a long way to go to be Les Steckel bad.