I am a retired senior citizen, having worked many years at one job, and sometimes adding two or three others to maintain a modest lifestyle. Lately, I have been visiting my local Wawa for free air in my tires, something that is not offered at many gas stations. The reason is a slow leak in one of my tires. I need new ones, but I’m unable to replace them currently.
There are always people, of different races, at the air pump in a similar bind. That is often evident right away. However, I couldn’t tell you their religions, job status or who they voted for. As we wait our turn for the hose, chatting ensues. Like me, they could use a new tire or two, but rent, medication or providing for their kids stand in the way.
Often, seeing my white hair, one or more these people offer to do the honors and fill my tire after theirs. This happens in two out of three visits, at least. I am always touched by their kindness. I always leave, along with an inflated tire, less deflated about America.
Americans have it much better than a lot of people around the world. However, everything being relative, we have problems, too. But, when facing a common dilemma, we can sympathize, empathize, and offer to help, no matter our differences. Let us all remember that the next time someone holds the door for you, offers to help you carry something to the car, or just listens to you as you wait on line.
Maryann Macdonald, Bradley Beach
Antisemitism was difficult to miss
In a recent column,“At Rutgers, strident students blow a chance to help Gaza,” Tom Moran writes that one Jewish organization who objects to the anti-Israel, pro-Palestine demonstrators at Rutgers could not “site [sic] incidents of antisemitism at Rutgers, beyond one offensive tweet.”
How other than antisemitic can you describe the calls to “globalize the intifada”? The intifada was a wave of terrorism that deliberately targeted Jewish civilians, and Rutgers students are calling to globalize it.
I guess Moran also missed a report in which Rutgers protesters shouted “Hitler would have loved you” at Jewish students. Or the time when activists plastered anti-Israel flyers with a Jewish girl’s face all over her dorm?
More fundamentally, the group Students for Justice in Palestine should be considered inherently antisemitic, as they oppose the lone Jewish state. Imagine telling an Italian-American that you oppose the existence of Italy as a nation, but don’t worry, because you’re not anti-Italian.
What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. The antisemitism is there for all to see. Moran might want to get his sight checked.
Noah Glyn, Manalapan
Biden can end the bombing
As the Israel-Hamas war continues, dissatisfaction with how the Biden administration is handling it widens. According to a Harvard/Institute of Politics poll, 81% of those younger than age 35 disapprove of how President Joe Biden is handling the war and his general support for Israel and its killing of Gazan civilians.
Will another wave of student loan forgiveness, as Biden is considering, save him from continuing to fall in the polls among young voters? I don’t think so. Loan forgiveness does not attack the root cause of that problem: the rising cost of higher education.
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, the progressive Vermont independent, among other politicians, is voicing concern about how the war issue can be decisive about who the next president will be.Sanders told CNN that many people think this may be Biden’s Vietnam: “Lyndon Johnson in many respects was a very, very good president domestically… . He chose not to run in ‘68 because of opposition to his views on Vietnam. And I am worried very much that President Biden is putting himself in a position where he has alienated not just young people, but a lot of the Democratic base in terms of his views on Israel and this war… .”
As columnist Medhi Hassan wrote in The Guardian, Biden can do as Ronald Reagan did in August 1982. After 11 consecutive hours in which Israel bombed Beirut, killing more than 100 during an extended effort against the PLO, an outraged Reagan called his counterpart, Menachim Begin, demanding a cease fire. The bombing ended in 20 minutes.
We should never forget that President Biden is choosing not to do this simple act. Many of us will remember this when voting for the next president in November.
Maria Dorigo, Montclair
Remember painter with Princeton ties
Frank Stella was a painter, sculptor and printmaker whoseconstantly evolving works are hailed as landmarks of the minimalist and post-painterly abstraction art movements. He died May 4 at age 87.
Stella studied at Princeton University before moving to New York City in the late 1950s. At that time, many prominent American artists had embraced abstract impressionism, but Stella began exploring minimalism. By age 23, he had created a series of flat, black paintings with grid-like bands and stripes using house paint and exposed canvas that drew widespread critical acclaim.
Over the next decade, his works retained his rigorous structure but began incorporating curved lines and bright colors, such as in his influential “Protractor”series, named after the geometry tool he used to create the curved shapes of the large-scale paintings. In the late 1970s, he began adding three-dimensionality to his visual art, using metals and other mixed media to blur the boundary between painting and sculpture.
We will remember Frank Stella always.
Paul Bacon, Hallandale Beach, Fla.
Five-star review from Hannibal Lecter?
In Kristi Noem’s new book, “No Going Back: The Truth on What’s Wrong with Politics and How We Move America Forward,” the South Dakota Republican governor details killing her 14-month-old pointer puppy because it kept playfully romping with game birds, ruining an otherwise good pheasant hunt.
Perhaps the book’s publisher, Center Street, ought to consider renaming the tome “Silence of the Puppies” and gifting a complimentary copy to Hannibal Lecter, if they can find him.
What demon possesses this woman who wants to be vice president on a ticket with a name I shall not mention?
Rudy Larini, Somerset
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