Teamsters president Sean O'Brien betrays union workers by speaking at RNC

Monday night, Sean O’Brien, president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, spoke at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.

Never in the history of organized labor in this country has anyone ever betrayed working men and women more than O'Brien.

President Joe Biden gave this union and its Central States Pension Fund $36 billion to save the pensions that their members had worked for. Every member of labor should get together and demand that this guy step down ASAP.

O'Brien spoke knowing that the Republican plan in Project 2025 would do away with most if not all worker rights and unions in general.

Jeff Carr, Carol Stream (retired vice president, UFCW Local 1546)

Don’t assume Trump shooter was politically motivated

Newspaper editorial boards, historians and varied political pundits have taken the attack on Donald Trump as a statement of the dangerous state of political discord in America. They have described the shooting as an attempted assassination.

Assassinations are attempts by angry, dissident political elements to alter a country’s leadership. To refer to the shooting of Trump as an assassination attempt, we would need to know the shooter’s motivation. We do not.

Scores of murders sadly occur at community events in the U.S. each year. We do not call them assassinations. The murders at the Highland Park Fourth of July parade were not assassinations. We use this designation only for political murders.

We may never learn the shooter's specific motivation. However, we have some information that may be informative.

The shooter was a bright high school student. Other students described him as a loner who was bullied. Two years out of high school, he was employed. But his job clearly did not utilize the academic talent and abilities he demonstrated in high school. How might such a man have felt? Could he have believed that he had no future? Could shooting the president have offered him a means to make a mark on the world in his brief life even if he were killed?

We may never know the answer to these questions. Although his target was Trump, his age and behavior parallels that of other mass shooters.

The attempt on Trump’s life is likely unrelated to the state of our political climate but related to the ease in which individuals may obtain access to AR-15s and ammunition.

Sidney Weissman, M.D., clinical professor of psychiatry and behavioral science, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine

Trump looks tired, and media should say so

I’m just wondering how fair the press and media will be when reporting how Donald Trump looks at his own convention. Of course, he’s under the weather. No animation, no smiles, seemed out of it, could barely raise himself to a standing position. No mention of this. Crickets. What about the same mercy for President Joe Biden?

Patricia Nowlan, Oak Park

The risks of going electric

Tuesday and Wednesday mornings, print editions of the newspaper did not get created on time due to a power outage.

The city is thinking about eliminating gas stoves in new construction, and there is a push to go to electric vehicles. How will we be able to use all our appliances and electric car charging capabilities when the power goes out?

Tom DeDore, Garfield Ridge