Write A Letter To The Editor – Use Your Voice 101
3 min read
A Letter to the NY Times Editor from a RESULTS Riverside/San Bernadino volunteer says it all. We did not vote for this.
This letter to the editor from Lynne Patalano, a Southern California anti-poverty advocate with citizen lobbying group RESULTS was published in the NY Times editorial section: “Countering ‘Psychic Numbing’ in the Trump Era” on Monday, June 2, 2025. Lynne wrote this letter to the editor (LTE) in response to a guest essay on New York Times dot com, published in the Times Opinion Section “‘I Even Believe He Is Destroying the American Presidency,’” by Thomas B. Edsall (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, May 20).
To the Editor:
“‘I Even Believe He Is Destroying the American Presidency,’” by Thomas B. Edsall (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, May 20), should be required reading for every member of Congress.
I vote in every election. I affirm what was suggested in the article: that we didn’t vote to destroy the government of the country we love.
My friends and neighbors didn’t vote to stop American universities from leading the world in science innovation. We didn’t vote to stop medical research. We didn’t vote to decrease SNAP benefits and make neighbors hungrier.
Nobody voted so that weather and disaster relief experts would be underfunded. We didn’t vote to tear Medicaid apart, to cut funding for nursing home care or to stop safely delivering babies in rural hospitals. We didn’t vote to have trade wars with the whole world. We did not vote to purge competent people from the government.
We were proud of our leadership in global affairs. We didn’t vote for tuberculosis to spread unchecked and AIDS to kill more people. We did not vote to let food and medicine rot so babies would die. We didn’t vote to embrace dictators and insult allies. We didn’t want our nation to stand apart from other prosperous countries in shame and diminished freedoms.
Nobody voted to give a mandate to the cruelty and incompetence we are seeing in this “big, beautiful bill.”
Congress seems to acquiesce to the lie that we voters wanted this destruction. Put them on notice: We did not vote for this.
Lynne Patalano
Beaumont, Calif.
RESULTS has a vision of a world beyond poverty
There is no better time than now to learn about the work that RESULTS is doing to create a better life for everyone on the planet. If you can donate some of your time, talent or treasure… they will teach you to be an advocate and to use your voice for positive change in this country and beyond. There is no better time than right now.
People have the power
RESULTS is a movement of passionate, committed everyday people in the US and across the globe. They believe poverty is not inevitable, and that our voices have power. Together, RESULTS volunteers move lawmakers to build a more just and equitable world. They envision a world beyond poverty and the oppression that causes it. Learn more about their important work at their website Results.org
