Donald Trump launched an illegal attack on Iran without any consideration about political collateral damage or the enormous financial cost

Military conflict with Iran launched by the U.S. and Israel on February 28, 2026, resulted in severe retaliatory strikes against U.S. regional bases, allied nations, and shipping lanes, sparking intense debate over whether the human and economic costs were fully weighed.

Dear Donald Trump- Echo letter published InForum in North Dakota:

Did it ever occur to you to count the cost before you committed our nation to war with Iran❓

Did it ever occur to you that Iran would return fire and attack American bases and allies in the Persian Gulf and the Middle East

Did you look at worst-case scenarios like the closing of the Strait of Hormuz before any of our ships sailed to the Persian Gulf❓

Did you consult with our allies in Canada, Europe, Asia and Latin America, and use diplomacy to garner their support❓

Did you imagine that this war would last not weeks, but months or even years?

Did you and your team ever think about the rise of gas and diesel prices, and what impact that would have on ordinary families and businesses❓

Did you consider telling Mr. Netanyahu, prime minister of Israel, “No❓”

Did you think how threatening to end the Persian six thousand yeas of civilization would violate international law❓

Did you ever think that the oppressed Iranian populace would suffer more when civilian infrastructure like bridges, water desalinization plants, power plants, etc. were bombed❓

In just five months through this war of choice, the United States of America has violated international laws, the Geneva Convention, and the moral teachings of Jesus Christ “to love your neighbor as yourself.”

Yes, the Iranian regime has blood on its hands and has made threats against our nation, but those words and even support of terrorists hardly justify the military mess you and your administration have gotten our nation into by resorting to bombs, missiles and malice, instead of using diplomacy and building an international coalition.

Stop and think, Donald Trump. Americans will be paying💲 for your personal decision to go to war with Iran for many generations to come.

Pastor Marty Toepke-Floyd is a retired ordained elder of the United Methodist Church in Jamestown, North Dakota.

Donald Trump and maga Republicans ignore tariff war reality! Duh? Manufactureing in America will not bring any tariff revenues into the economy

Echo opinion letter published in the Grand Forks Herald a newspaper serving North Dakota and parts of Minnesota: Donald Trump's tariffs don't make sense (ya'think❓)

As we approach another (dumb❗) tariff deadline on August 1st, it’s made think about what the point of all this economic chaos could be❓

Tariffs are on; no, just kidding they’re off; actually they’re on, but they’re delayed and the whole world will hurt “bigly” unless they trade with us — or we might delay them again.

Certainly, there must be a reason. As far as I can tell, the administration has stated three main goals. (1) They want the tariffs to bring back manufacturing to the United States (okay, but "when"❓; (2) they want the tariffs to lead to better trade deals that are more favorable to the purchasing power of the United States (okay, but "how so", when these "partners" are finding other international customers❓; (3) and they want to balance the budget with the revenue from Donald Trump’s tariffs (all while the rich get richer with tax cuts that could have achieved this third elusive objective).

All three of these goals are mutually exclusive. If you want the tariffs to bring back manufacturing, then they can’t be bargaining chips, because dropping tariffs (as would be a possibility in a negotiation) would end the protection for domestic manufacturing. 

Likewise, they can’t be used to increase revenue for balancing the budget if we’re going to drop them when we get a favorable deal.🙄 They also can’t be used to increase revenue if the plan is to restore domestic production. The revenue for tariffs comes from the importer paying duties  (a.k.a. "taxes:) when the goods are brought into the country. If you onshore manufacturing, you’ll no longer be bringing in goods to be tariffed, meaning you won’t have that revenue to balance the budget. 

The Donald Trump trade war makes no sense.

From Tony Hollingsworth in Grand Forks

1

Donald Trump showsbsigns of cognitive impairmen and dangerous mental incompetnce

Echo opinion letters published in the Grand Forks Herald

Donald Trump and cognitive incompetence, an opinion letter:
Donld Trump is truly unfit to rule❗

He would come back to the same topic three or four times during the hour-long attempted conversation, repeating the same things. He changed his mind on things on a daily basis and often forgot what he had said.

During Trump's news conference, we sitnesses his incompetent clown car cabinet.

He did exactly the same and acted the same way. At several points he went back to his same old rally points, i.e. the press is corrupt; Russia, Russia, Russia; people who preceded him were idiots; other countries emptied out their insane asylums and sent them here; the planes that bombed were beautiful; Democrats hate America etc., etc., etc.

He is obsessed with illegal immigrants.

I fear he is going down the same path as my brother.

Is he fit to rule as our dictator issuing executive orders like the one that banned paper straws in favor of plastic ones?

From Lee Murdock in Grand Forks North Dakota

I fear he is going down the same path as my brother, who had Alzheimer's.

Letter to the editor, My brother died of Alzheimer's two years ago. During the last stages, even though I knew it was a futile effort, I tried to call and visit with him. No matter how hard I tried to keep him on a topic he would wander off onto related and often unrelated topics.

He would come back to the same topic three or four times during the hour-long attempted conversation, repeating the same things. He changed his mind on things on a daily basis and often forgot what he had said.

I watched Donald Trump's news conference with his (clown car) cabinet. He did exactly the same and acted the same way. 

At several points he went back to his same old rally points, i.e. the press is corrupt; Russia, Russia, Russia; people who preceded him were idiots; other countries emptied out their insane asylums and sent them here; the planes that bombed were beautiful; Democrats hate America etc., etc., etc.

He is obsessed with demonizing innocent immigrants.

I fear he is going down the same path as my brother.

Is he fit to rule as our dictator issuing executive orders like the one

 that banned paper straws in favor of plastic ones?

From Lee Murdock in Grand Forks, North Dakota

Donald Trump and Republicans failed to make anything in America great! They are trashing democracy. Mayday! SOS!

During Donald Trump's Republican failed first 100 days in "Trump 2.0" his administration has already caused a drop in the "Make American brand.....(Echo opinion letter published in the InForum, a North Dakota newspaper: 

New Mottos for Donald Trump.  

Donald Trump's failed "Make America" campaign has succeeded in making America.....(fill in the blanks....)

Letter: Make America What Again?
Lee Purrier writes that making election decisions based on slogans such as MAGA is irresponsible and dangerous.

Weak Again. Alienating our allies around the world, appeasing Russia’s Putin, appointing incompetent people to lead the Department of Defense and our intelligence and national security agencies makes us more defenseless as a nation. Gutting the cybersecurity agency makes us more open to a flood of

Lawless Again. Refusing to obey the rulings of our courts, including the US Supreme Court, ignoring the Constitutional roles of the presidency and Congress, deporting people, including U.S, citizens, without due process, all this moves our country toward authoritarianism.

Sicker Again. Appointing RFK Jr., who has no healthcare background and holds unscientific and conspiratorial views, to head our largest health agency, the Department of Health and Human Services, will lead to outbreaks of diseases (such as measles), leave us unprepared for the next pandemic, and firing researchers who were working on cures to diseases, these actions make all of us more vulnerable to illness and death. Drastic cuts to Medicaid will leave millions without healthcare.

Polluted Again. Rolling back clear air, water, and safety regulations will return us to the days when our rivers, lakes and air were polluted and food-born illnesses were commonplace. Ending the efforts to fight climate change will result in more frequent and powerful weather events, wild fires, rising sea levels, and accelerated global warming.

Ignorant Again. Shutting down the Department of Education, withholding funding for university research, interfering in local educational decisions, cutting funding for special education, all these harm educational quality and access.What is more costly than education is ignorance.

To keep our country a democracy we need it to be strong, law abiding, healthy, safe, educated and free. #ImpeachTrumpNOW!

From Daniel Rice, he lives in Fargo North Dakota

January 6 was a act of sedition

Opinion echo letter published in InForUm in Fargo, North Dakota:

Fox "Fake" News and other crazy rightwing media have characterized the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol as "legitimate political discourse." (Not!)

This howling right wing insurrectionist is not engaged in legitimate political discourse.

                                                   

Webster's dictionary defines "discourse" as reasoned, often formal, communication of information and ideas. The events of January 6 were mob mayhem--anything but discourse.

Likewise, by smashing their way into the Capitol building, doing heavy damage, violently assaulting the uniformed guards, and gravely threatening the vice president and Congressional legislators, the assailants cannot make any claim to legitimacy.

Worse yet, motivation for the whole event was former President Trump's "Big Lie" about a stolen election. He made the claim of a stolen, fraudulent election in 2016 when he lost the popular vote. With the full resources of the government for four years, he never proved his claim. But when he lost the popular vote in 2020 by 7 million votes, out came the same lie, bigger and louder and again with no proof, as his loyal hand-picked Attorney General Bill Barr has testified.

Trump scheduled his January 6 rally and goaded the riotous mob to come to the Capitol at the precise day and hour that they would interfere with Congress' Constitutional duty to accept the results of the 2020, vote of the people. This deliberate blockage of the function of our established government was not only illegitimate, it plainly met Webster's definition of an act of sedition---a major crime against the democratic government of the people of the United States.

Dudley Wells lives in Twin Valley, Minnesota

Support for voters rights is protecting our American democracy!

Vote! #ForThePeople

Shameful reminder and an echo opinion letter published in Opelika -Auburn news, in North Dakota:  

The failure of passage (or even debate) of the “For the People” voting rights bill is a shameful reminder that one of our national parties fears democracy. 

Senator John Thune’s defense of the Republican stance on Monday’s PBS News was unconvincing. 

What pointed out, quite accurately, was that existing election procedures allowed for the best participation in a national election in decades last fall, but he failed to note how that very success has led to many Republican-led state legislatures, Alabama’s included, to try to make sure such participation could never happen again.

I hope that there is still the possibility of passing the John Lewis bill and/or the compromise proposed by Senator Manchin. Almost everyone can support reasonable voter ID requirements. 

But i,t is unconscionable for the Federal government to allow states or anybody to purposefully make voting difficult for a large number of qualified voters.

I am disappointed that retiring Senator Shelby failed to stand for such a basic principle as the right of every citizen to vote.

Charlotte Ward Auburn, North Dakota

Obstruction of Justice by Donald Trump are "thousandfold" more than anything in the past

"Trump is a compulsive liar"....

Donald Trump is guilty of serial documented occasions when he has deliberately obstructed justice.

This echo opinion letter was published in the Bismark Tribune, a North Dakota newspaper. 

Does obstruction of justice sound familiar? “The thing that's so appalling to me is that the president, when this whole idea was suggested to him, didn't, in righteous indignation, rise up and say, get out of here, you're in the office of the president of the United States. How can you talk about blackmail and bribery and keeping witnesses silent? 

This is the presidency of the United States. But my president didn't do that. He sat there and he worked and worked to try to cover this thing up so it wouldn't come to light.”

Evidence of Donald Trump directing obstruction of justice is enough to begin impeachment.

Actually, it’s Republican Rep. Lawrence Hogan who said it in 1974, in the House Judiciary Committee.

He was the only high-minded Republican representative to vote to impeach President Richard Nixon.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler has subpoenaed former White House counsel Don McGahn, seeking testimony and documents related to the committee’s investigation into obstruction of justice by President Donald Trump. 

In fact, Nadler also subpoenaed the Justice Department for the uncensored copy of the Robert Mueller report, and requested that Mueller testify before the committee.
Paul Rosenzweig, who served as counsel to Ken Starr, (who recommended the impeachment of President Bill Clinton), said Trump’s attempts to obstruct justice are a “thousandfold” more than anything Clinton did.
Trump is a compulsive liar. The Washington Post has documented evidence, that as president, he has made more then 10,000 false or misleading claims.

At a political rally in Wisconsin, as his crowd booed and screamed; Trump described a hideous scenario that he insists Democrats approve of:

Evil tRump falsely claimed.....

(Lies!) Ugh.....

“The baby is born, the mother meets with the doctor, they take care of the baby, they wrap the baby beautifully and then the doctor and the mother determine whether or not they will execute the baby.” He then made a chopping motion with his hand.

Larry Larsen, Mandan, North Dakota, an echo opinion letter to the editor.

Voter suppression happens as described by the Republican John Meredith

Echo opinion published in the Birmingham Alabama newspaper AL.com by John Meredith

Remembering what happened to his father.....

I learned what voter suppression is and the lengths some will go to keep others from voting. Whether suppression occurs at the end of a racist’s gun or by the stroke of a lawmaker’s pen, it is an act of cowardice. It is the last ditch effort of a party that no longer wins on its merits and must cheat to succeed.

John Meredith of Huntsville, is a former Capitol Hill lobbyist who was recognized as one of the country’s 100 most influential Black Republicans.

Ever since the landmark Supreme Court decision in 2013 that gutted Section 5 of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, it is the GOP that has used unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud to justify the wholesale disenfranchisement of minority communities.

Students at historically black colleges throughout the south have found their right to vote under attack with the passage of laws either restricting the registration of student voters or forcing them to vote at off-campus locations.

In North Dakota, 5,000 Native Americans had their voting rights taken away when rules were changed requiring street addresses to vote when state government only provides them post offices boxes. There is no denying this act of voter suppression is entirely race-based. Unfortunately, in today’s post-truth society, if your vote stands in the way of a Republican victory it will be suppressed.

The worst single offender of voter suppression in America is Georgia gubernatorial candidate Brian Kemp. 

Secretary of State since 2012, Kemp has taken voting rights from over 1.6 million Georgians during his time in office.

If Republican majorities begin to narrow in the years to come, even more nefarious and judicially sanctioned voter suppression efforts will be deployed against the American people. My Republican friends will contend I’m crazy to say anyone will have their right to vote unjustly taken.

I will then have to remind them that blacks terrorized under Jim Crowe unjustly lost their vote for nearly 100 years. To those who insist “that would never happen today,” I simply respond, “an entire race in North Dakota living on reservations controlled by the U.S. Government lost their right to vote this year.”

America is a vast and differing nation. The GOP once embraced that diversity. Today’s Republican Party is shrinking and becoming homogeneous. As this transformation occurs, it would be wise for those of us remaining in the party to stop acting as though anyone who disagrees with us is somehow unpatriotic, or worse, unworthy of the right to vote.

Republicans and soybeans

It makes no sense to me (Maine Writer) that North Dakota farmers would support Republicans who won't stand up to Donald Trump, when the trade policies initiated by Trump's harmful policies are causing harm to their well being and maybe to the future of agribusiness.

This echo article published in the North Dakota opinion page of the Grand Forks Herald by Rob Port.

A harbinger of worry for North Dakota....

Although the opinion is about soybeans, the issue expands, in my mind, to how this problem can eventually impact on the American food supply. It's about soybeans but it could be almost any crop. Eventually farmers will stop planting what does not sell unless Republicans do something to stop Donald Trump's irresponsible trade wars.

“Elevators in the eastern portion of the state have pulled their bids for soybeans,” Dr. Frayne Olson, a crop economics expert from North Dakota State University, tells the Williston Herald. “There is literally no price for soybeans.”

Right now Olson said there is only a small number of elevators in our region where this is a problem, but that he expects the problem to grow.

If he’s right, this is a real political problem for Republicans. Particularly the two Republicans running for Congress this cycle: U.S. House candidate Kelly Armstrong and Senate candidate Kevin Cramer.

For months now Democrats have invested themselves heavily in messaging critical of the Trump administration’s trade policies and the collateral damage they’ve caused to American businesses. Particularly in the agriculture industry.

While it’s fair to say that much of that rhetoric has been hyperbole, (Oh, paleeeze IMO too much cliche here!) there has been always been an element of truth to it as well.

Republicans, meanwhile, have been forced into a balancing act where they express concern about the side effects of Trump’s approach to trade while simultaneously expressing support for his overarching goals. That’s been their public messaging, anyway.

Privately I’ve had Republicans working on these campaigns tell me that if some of this uncertainty for agriculture isn’t cleared up – and by that they meant both the trade issues and the lingering debate over the farm bill – they’re going to have problems.

It seems, based on these reports about soybeans, the problems have arrived.

But how will that impact voting trends?

On one hand, voters are very much influenced by recency bias. Republicans can argue that short term turbulence in the commodities markets is the price of admission to making real progress toward better trade deals, but that probably comes as cold comfort to farmers staring down the barrel of real financial losses in the here and now.

On the other hand even Democrats acknowledge that the impetus for Trump kicking off this trade war – the idea that America has received the short end of the stick from trade partners like China – is real. And when asked what they’d do differently to solve the problem they admit is real they start running down a litany of approaches which have all been tried in the past.

Trump supporters – and there may be no other place in the country where Trump has more political support than North Dakota – voted for him because they wanted a new approach to persistent problems like trade and immigration. If those voters in North Dakota can keep the faith, even while some of them take a hit to the bank account, it will go well for Republicans.

If Democrats can successfully convince voters to pay attention to short term pain, instead of the possibilities of long term gains, it will go well for them.

Based on all of the publicly available polling data we have Armstrong has a commanding lead over Democrat Mac Schneider in the House race. This issue, even if it hurts him, probably won’t turn the election.

In the Senate race, while it’s clear that Cramer has the momentum in this moment, this issue could turn on him very quickly and throw victory to incumbent (and competent) Senator Heidi Heitkamp.

Echo on Trump's failed Helsinki performance

An echo opinion- editorial published in The Washington Post and reprinted in the Grand Forks Herald in North Dakota.

Poll: Americans give Trump negative marks for Helsinki performance

By wide margins, Americans give President Donald Trump negative marks for his conduct during a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin last week and for his casting doubt on U.S. intelligence conclusions that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election, a new Washington Post-ABC News poll finds.

But public reaction nationally appears more muted than in Washington, where Trump faced withering bipartisan criticism for appearing to side with Putin over U.S. intelligence agencies at a Monday news conference in Helsinki. Most Americans do not feel Trump went "too far" in supporting Putin, and while more Americans say U.S. leadership has gotten weaker than stronger under Trump, his ratings on this question are slightly improved from last fall.

The findings indicate that while Trump was judged critically for his summit performance, the event has not at this time proved to be a significant turning point in his presidency, despite the sharp criticism he received in the hours and days after the meeting and the multiple efforts by White House officials and the president to clarify his (double negative?) remarks in Helsinki. 

Unfortunately, the poll results suggest that overall attitudes toward the president have hardened on both sides and that major events like Helsinki produce only modest changes in his overall standing, if any.

The Post-ABC poll conducted Wednesday through Friday finds that overall, 33 percent of Americans approve of Trump's handling of his meeting with Putin while 50 percent disapprove. A sizable 18 percent say they have no opinion. A slightly larger 56 percent disapprove of Trump expressing doubts about U.S. intelligence agencies' conclusion that Russia tried to influence the outcome of the 2016 election. On both questions, those who say they "strongly disapprove" of Trump's performance outnumber those who say they "strongly approve" by better than 2 to 1.

Trump's ratings for handling the summit represent a weakened moment for him, but they are not markedly worse than ratings of his presidency overall in other recent polls. A Washington Post-Schar School poll earlier this month, for instance, found 43 percent approved of Trump's job performance while 55 percent disapproved, with strong disapproval outpacing strong approval by roughly 2 to 1.

The new Post-ABC poll finds 40 percent saying Trump went "too far" in supporting Putin, a criticism that was voiced by both Democrats and Republicans in Washington over the past week.

(Incredulously!) ~ However, almost as many - 35 percent - say Trump handled Putin "about right," while another 15 percent say he did not go far enough to support Putin. The rest have no opinion. Democrats, liberals and college graduates are the only groups in the poll among whom a majority say Trump went too far in supporting Putin.

Partisans split in their ratings of Trump's meeting with Putin, but Republicans are less united in support for Trump than in other recent polls about his presidency. Among Democrats, 83 percent disapprove of Trump's handling of the meeting, while among Republicans, 66 percent approve of Trump's performance. By way of comparison, in the Post-Schar School survey, 87 percent of Republicans said they approved of Trump's overall job performance as president.

A bare majority of Republicans in the new poll - 51 percent - approve of Trump expressing doubts about U.S. intelligence conclusions on Russian election interference. But a smaller 31 percent disapprove, with 18 percent offering no opinion. Among Democrats, 78 percent disapprove of what Trump said about U.S. intelligence findings, as do 59 percent of independents.

Independents lean negative on Trump's handling of the summit overall, with 33 percent approving and 46 percent disapproving. Self-identified "moderates" are particularly negative, with 64 percent disapproving of how Trump handled the meeting, nearly as high as 73 percent among liberals. A smaller 58 percent majority of conservatives approve of Trump's conduct at the summit.

The Post-ABC poll finds that 47 percent say that under Trump, America's leadership in the world has gotten weaker, versus 30 percent who say it has gotten stronger. That is an improvement on last November, when the margin between those who said weaker versus those who said stronger was 27 percentage points.

Despite Republicans' lukewarm support for Trump's Helsinki performance, they express growing confidence in his ability to project U.S. strength around the world. A 74 percent majority of Republicans say American leadership has "gotten stronger" under Trump, up from 53 percent last November and 61 percent last July. By contrast, 80 percent of Democrats currently say Trump has weakened U.S. leadership around the world.

On this question, independents lean more negatively than positively, with 22 percent saying America's leadership has gotten stronger under Trump, 47 percent weaker and about one-quarter saying it has stayed the same.

College graduates had a much sharper negative reaction to Putin's summit than those without college degrees - college grads are 18 points more likely to disapprove of Trump's summit performance (62 percent vs. 44 percent). Those without college degrees are nearly three times as likely to say they have no opinion of Trump's performance.

In contrast to many surveys about the president and politics, the Helsinki poll produced only modest gender differences. Men were slightly less disapproving of the president's handling of the summit than women, but the gap was not statistically significant.

Young Americans - those under age 40 - gave Trump lower marks for his overall handling of the summit than did those over 40. But younger and older Americans tended to offer similar assessments to other questions.

The Post-ABC poll was conducted by landlines and cellphones from July 18 to 20 among a random national sample of 464 adults. Overall results have a margin of sampling error of 5.5 percentage points, which is larger among subgroups.