www.silverguide.site –

Re Jonathan Freedland’s column (I used to revere the great experiment that is the United States. After Trump, I’m not so sure, 3 July), there are two overwhelming horrors of the Trump presidency that have permanently altered the governance of the US.

First, paid officials of the state implement his orders with little question, because of the weird concept of the commander-in-chief, given more reverence than most religious leaders. There are no crazy military or political orders that will not be obeyed, though they might be rescinded at a later date by the courts – after the damage has been done.

Second, the reordering of the powers between the branches of government will not be reversed by any future president of any political flavour. They will find them too useful and so will keep them in reserve – just in case. The supreme court will not reinterpret them in the foreseeable future, if for no other reason than its reverence for the concept of the commander-in-chief.

That leaves the two houses of Congress having to pass amendments to the constitution that will have to be ratified state by state. Another very long wait. The 250-year experiment that Jonathan Freedland refers to has come to an end.
Ged Parker
Chair, The Friends of Washington Old Hall, Tyne and Wear

• Jonathan Freedland’s column should be required reading for all US citizens. It’s disheartening to see how people worldwide speak about the nation I have lived in for nearly 40 years. But it needs to be said.

The US has been destroyed by a wealthy class of oligarchs looking out for each other and their precious corporations, while the average person is left to – I don’t know – rot and die? The president truly does not care. Science is being ignored. Xenophobia runs amok. Division rules. It’s sad to see a mighty empire fall in real time.
Chris Flowers
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, US

• I agree with everything that Jonathan Freedland said in his column. I am an 84-year-old white American woman whose father was one of the founders of the CIA. After a youth believing in the innate goodness of our US government, in 1989 I started thinking for myself and became an anti-war racial-justice activist.

Although I am now a disabled elder with limited mobility, I retain the feeling that I must speak out against the abuses of my own government. Needless to say, the election of Donald J Trump to a second term has given me much to think about and express, now on social media rather than on the streets.

The country into which I was born has always had a mortal flaw, and that is its insistence on its exceptionalism. Even in this time of moral decay, the US continues to insist on believing it is better than everyone else.

It is not. And I do not believe the republic is anything to be celebrated on this 250th anniversary of its founding. I celebrate the courageous air force major Jason Watson, who stood by himself on the Capitol steps last week with a sign that read: “Impeach, convict, remove”. He was immediately handcuffed, arrested and taken off by the police for this “crime”.

His action is what democracy looks like. I wish I knew how to make my country what it should be, but I don’t. All I do know is that the change must not come from the top but from those who have been oppressed, ignored and forgotten.
Patricia Lay-Dorsey
Grosse Pointe Farms, Michigan, US

• Have an opinion on anything you’ve read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.