I took issue with the language used in Monica Hesse’s March 11 Style column, “Sexual politics are on the syllabi in new TV shows.” Describing a woman as suffering reputational damage because of “her connection to a horny man” excuses what should be inexcusable actions by men. The problem with men who abuse women or girls isn’t that they have strong libidos; it is that they have weaker ethics and diminished respect for others.
David Steele, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
The March 12 Politics & The Nation article “Senators seek review of DOJ’s handling of Epstein files” reported that the Justice Department has “released millions of pages of documents” related to Jeffrey Epstein “but Democrats and some Republicans in Congress have raised concerns about how faithfully it complied with the law.”
The Justice Department’s floods and trickles of Epstein files are being framed as transparency. They are not. Transparency is clarity, accountability and consequence. A document dump of this scale — unindexed, unexplained and overwhelming — risks becoming the bureaucratic equivalent of burying the truth in plain sight. Releasing millions of pages without a clear road map shifts the burden from the state to the public, journalists and the victims themselves to sift through the wreckage. That is not accountability; it is abdication. If the department is serious, it should produce a comprehensive summary, a clear accounting of prosecutorial decisions and renewed commitments to pursue any remaining avenues of responsibility.
Sunlight matters. But this glare risks blinding rather than revealing. The public deserves truth that can be understood — and justice that can be seen.
Jagjit Singh, Los Altos, California
Industrial-strength prevarication
Regarding the March 12 news article “White House takes first step toward permanent fix for tariffs ruled illegal”:
Citing Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, the Trump administration announced a move to impose new tariffs by accusing more than a dozen countries of having “structural excess capacity.” Although Section 301 doesn’t mention excess capacity, it does permit the U.S. Trade Representative to restrict imports from trading partners found to impose what the Congressional Research Service calls “unfair and inequitable” burdens on American trade.
Forget that the economic meaning of “unfair and inequitable” — like that of “excess capacity” — is so vague as to invite abuse. Instead, recognize that for a foreign government to artificially create excess capacity in any industry within its jurisdiction requires drawing workers and resources away from other industries within its jurisdiction. If some industries in, say, Japan, really do have excess capacity, then other industries in Japan must have inadequate capacity. This artificially created inadequate capacity not only self-inflicts economic harm on countries that have it; it also might cause some foreign industries to reduce their production, increasing Americans’ opportunities to export.
Protectionists, of course, never mention this flip side of the “excess capacity” argument for raising U.S. tariffs.
Donald J. Boudreaux, Fairfax
The writer is the Martha and Nelson Getchell chair for the study of free-market capitalism at George Mason University’s Mercatus Center.
A loan is a terrible thing to waste
Education Secretary Linda McMahon’s March 13 Friday Opinion essay, “Colleges can’t shirk this essential obligation,” was right to argue that institutions that benefit from federal student loan funding “have a moral and legal obligation to support the students whose borrowing sustains their operations.” But colleges need to do much more than be good stewards of taxpayer money; they first have to be good accountants.
Many colleges could cut their overhead costs in half, and reduce the time it takes to get a degree by the same amount. This tackles the cost problem on the supply side (at the colleges) and on the demand side (for the students). Faculty wages, staff levels and executive salaries have become extraordinarily bloated, while teaching load has gone down. Moreover, most colleges have no formal accountability to shareholders, like commercial corporations.
Without a major overhaul of college costs, student debt will merely continue to subsidize the university system. This assumes that student loans remain available — or desirable. They may not be. The implication for colleges is that they face the same kind of tough decision-making and cost control that everyone else does.
Matthew G. Andersson, Oak Brook, Illinois
A great place to start would be to require that all loan money, scholarships and other outside sources of funding for student education be deposited directly to the institution of higher learning in the student’s name. I hear from friends all the time about how their grandchildren and grandchildren’s friends take fabulous spring break trips to Europe, go on cruises, etc., thanks to loan money that was paid directly to the student instead of the university. Then, come graduation, for some unfathomable reason, the student cannot afford to pay back the loans, and many default.
I graduated from college in 1979. It took me 10 years, on the payment plans set up by the various institutions from which I had borrowed money, to pay back every single penny I owed. But I did it. I knew it was a privilege, not my right, to be able to borrow money.
Barbara Albro, Bluffton, South Carolina
Recommended reading
In his March 11 Wednesday Opinion essay, “The best education for future success might surprise you,” Greg Weiner argued that “artificial intelligence makes purely technical skills less valuable and human judgment more essential. There has never been a more powerful case for the liberal arts, a kind of education that cultivates human discernment.”
“The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution” by C.P. Snow was recommended reading by Rutgers University the summer before my freshman year. Snow, a physicist, described his circumstantial experience of working with people in the literature department during his tenure. He found that these realms are isolated, separate cultures that do not communicate with or understand each other. He concluded that civilization’s survival depended on bridging this gap.
This book caused me to change my four-year engineering major to a five-year engineering plan, which earned me a BS and a BA. During my education, I mixed with technical (literal) and nontechnical (liberal) people. Throughout my ensuing career, I was able to talk in both directions without an interpreter and write well in both languages. My BA had given me a perspective not common to most engineers.
My experience leads me to agree that future success will require the attainment of the “whole” perspective that liberal education provides: to see connections that enable meaningful discernment of AI results.
Alfred DeLucia, Leesburg
Post Opinions wants to know: How soon do you bring up politics when getting to know someone? Is a first date too soon? Share your response, and it might be published as a letter to the editor. wapo.st/discuss_politics
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