Letter of the week: The only side Trump is on is his own

“Trump’s going to lose it,” by Nicky Woolf, TNW #503

Perhaps Trump has been sent by a Supreme Being (probably not Vladimir Putin) to show the British people the sort of mess they would end up in if they voted for a Farage government.
Patrick Reynolds

Re: “Emily Maitlis’s Diary: Why are we turning away people who could make Britain richer?” TNW #503

My Hungarian aunt fell foul of the Nazis for helping her Jewish friends in 1942 when the Nazis invaded Hungary, and then fell foul of the Soviets for helping her friends who were so-called “class enemies”.

In 1947 she managed to get out, and came to the UK to be with her sister, my mother. She was immensely proud of her British citizenship, but it only became clear to me when she was suffering from dementia how very profound was her fear of it being taken away.

Admitted to hospital with a heart attack, she became agitated when the doctor asked routine questions, and kept insisting “I am a British citizen, I have a British passport. You have no right to question me”. There was nothing we could say to calm her.
Tessa Byars

I live in Northern Ireland and am of Scottish descent. To some hardline republicans I’m a “planter”. Reality is that my maternal great grandfather was a footman to the Marchioness of Londonderry, Churchill’s grandmother. My paternal grandfather mined iron ore in the Antrim hills. Almost all of us are descendants of people who moved around looking for work.
Hugh Marcus

Great Britain and Ireland are occupied by migrants from one age or another. The hunter gatherers arrived 11,000 years ago after the last Ice Age. The Neolithic farmers from the Mediterranean arrived around 6,000 years ago, and the “beaker people”, bringing Bronze Age technology, around 4,000 years ago. They all migrated here.
David Irwin

Re: “The power of talking to dead people,” by Alastair Campbell, TNW #503

What a wonderful piece to share. I’m on the west coast of Ireland in the middle of a power cut – and with rain teeming against the window and candles for light, your reflections are very comforting and real. Thank you, Alastair.
Angela Fitzpatrick

Re: “The mask has slipped – now we can see the real, shameful face of Reform,” by James Ball, TNW #503

The racism, misogyny and ignorance did not surprise me. More alarming was the repeated comment that Reform would become more extreme once in power because their real agenda is not popular enough to get them elected.
Neil Paterson

The lies, vitriol and hatred Reform have spewed have taken on a life of their own. There are now much darker forces carrying it all forward who may not be so bothered about winning an election to gain power.
Janet Bayford

I was just wondering, if you took all of the undercover reporters out of Reform UK, would they be left with any actual members?
Andrew Sillis

Suggested Reading

The mask has slipped – now we can see the real, shameful face of Reform

James Ball

Re: “The riots in France are being stoked by Russia and Iran,” by Emma-Kate Symons, TNW #503

Just as drugs, alcohol, cigarettes and guns are controlled by statute, social media will also need to be controlled by statute. The risible defence that social media companies are not publishers needs to be rejected.  When algorithms are designed to generate rage to drive use, there is only one outcome – damaged people, damaged societies, damaged countries. 
Guy Masters

Re: “The moral depravity of Robert Jenrick,” by Sunder Katwala, TNW #503

“Moral depravity” is a good way of putting it. “Honest Bob” is rather reminiscent of Oswald Mosley, who started out as a mainstream party MP and government minister before lurching off to the far right. 
Philip Neale

Re: “Eating a raw prawn and a cake of lies”, TNW #503

I was amused by Adam Sharp’s piece about other countries’ versions of “are you pulling my leg”, but was surprised he didn’t include a common version that I recall hearing when I lived in Germany many years ago. 

The response was often: “Du kanst mich am Arsch lecken”, or simply “Leck mich am Arsch”. I must admit to have found it mildly shocking until I got used to it. In 1782 Mozart wrote a canon for six voices with the title “Leck mich im Arsch”.
Martin Walters

Re: “Why everyone (including me) secretly loves country music” by David Quantick, TNW #503
David Quantick wrote that country is a broad church. It was therefore puzzling how he dismissed Americana “aka alt.country, aka dressing up like you wish The Band were still going.” Firstly, it hasn’t been called alt.country for at least 20 years and secondly, Americana is possibly a broader church than mainstream country. 

The top five albums in the current Americana Music Association chart are by Billy Strings, Kacey Musgraves, Charley Crockett, Pokey LaFarge and Buddy Miller – artists with very different styles and influences. I find it ironic that in an article that attempts to address the cliché view of country music, he posits a similar one for Americana.
Michael Hingston

Re: “Why are ‘serious’ music fans so snobbish about tribute acts?” by Paul Hanley, TNW #503

Years ago I watched The Smyths at a time when I was still shelling out for Morrissey gigs. Me and my mate both agreed: they sounded more like The Smiths than Moz, and we had a better night.
Ste Thomas

BELOW THE LINE

Re: “Aberfan: the pictures that show a village frozen by tragedy,” by Dai Morris, TNW #503: 

My mother, heavily pregnant and coping with a two-year old, watched the scenes unfold at Aberfan on the news. The midwife attending the birth was Welsh. Both of them cried as they watched the news reports. As I approach my 60th birthday, I still think about Aberfan. 
David Dickinson

I still remember watching the Tonight programme on BBC from Aberfan that evening. I was 15 and we were watching this awful disaster unfold on a small black and white TV, which made it seem all the more bleak. I’ve followed the villagers’ stories over the years with the same kind of outrage that I feel about the Post Office Horizon scandal, the Grenfell Tower fire, Hillsborough, the water industry and the rest. Their story is a metaphor for the story of Britain. 
Janet Bayford

Re: “Bonnie Garmus: ‘Donald Trump would not understand my book’,” by Eleanor Longman Rood, TNW #503:

Trump doesn’t understand any book. His actions on Iran, Afghanistan, Russia, China and tariffs show he doesn’t even understand his own ghost-written book, The Art of the Deal.
Paul Shields