I don’t think Martin Kettle realises why some of us are so opposed Trump’s visit (I know many are deeply opposed to Trump’s visit. But Keir Starmer doesn’t have that luxury, 17 September). It’s not just his authoritarian domestic policy, tariffs or indulgence of Israel’s brutality towards Palestinians. It’s his toxic influence on British domestic politics enabled by Keir Starmer.
Our chameleon-like prime minister takes on the colours of whichever powerful person he meets. In this instance, xenophobia, racism and the tech bro politics of Donald Trump. Is not his indulgence of Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson’s unpleasant politics due to his wish not to offend his powerful guest? His “land of strangers” speech seems to indicate a willingness to import the divisive practices of Maga politics to Britain to appease his powerful guest.
Derrick Joad
Leeds
• Martin Kettle is right to say that the wooing of Donald Trump with bands and blandishments, however disagreeable, is “necessary work”. When trying to get what he needed from a US leader of considerably greater constancy, Winston Churchill still confessed that “no lover ever studied every whim of his mistress as I did those of President Roosevelt”.
Rev Robert Titley
London
• You have to be in the playground to tackle the bullies.
Jane Edwards
Sheffield
• Perhaps that Carol Ann Duffy poem (17 September) should have been projected on Windsor Castle.
Michael Fuller
Ampthill, Bedfordshire
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