Remember when it was fun to be an O’s fan?

It’s funny how seasons can be so diametrically opposite for a wayward baseball team we call the Orioles (“5 things Mike Elias said to explain the Orioles firing Brandon Hyde,” May 21). Last season, the organization was tickled about the way the clubhouse atmosphere was always positive, upbeat and guys had fun being an Oriole.

Winning has an uncanny way of turning naysayers into believers. Last season, O’s fans were totally behind the team. So who snuffed out the Orioles’ candle on their way to being a consistent playoff team? This current team has garnered a new reputation for leaving runs in scoring position. That is totally unacceptable.

There are myriad other issues too numerous to mention in this rant. Lately, it seems the Orioles players arrive to the ballpark, play the game then go back to the hotel. This is uninspired baseball at its lowest and we need not stand for it.

— Patrick R. Lynch, Towson

America can’t be isolationist in today’s world

When Armstrong Williams writes in his column “What would Founding Fathers think of Trump’s foreign policy?” that Russia “fears American encirclement,” he ignores the observation by George F. Kennan, “the father of containment”:

“The jealous and intolerant eye of the Kremlin can distinguish, in the end, only vassals and enemies; and the neighbors of Russia, if they do not wish to be the one, must reconcile themselves to being the other.”

Gary Saul Morson of Northwestern University has repeatedly made the same point about Russia; and Williams might ask the Taiwanese, the Australians, the New Zealanders, the Filipinos and you-name-it how they like the idea of being in the Chinese Communist Party’s idea of China’s “sphere of influence in Asia.” We have learned some hard lessons about nation-building in several of the wars that Williams mentions, but we don’t live in the world of Washington and Jefferson anymore and it’s dangerous to pretend that we do.

— Jeffrey M. Landaw, Pikesville

Do not ignore mass killings of Gaza civilians

The shooting of a young Israeli couple outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., was a heinous act no matter what inspired it. The Baltimore Sun’s recent editorial rightly condemns it (“Never again means never again,” May 22). However, the lengthy piece does a bare minimum in pointing out what has been fueling pro-Palestinian demonstrations and anti-Israel sentiments.

“Israel’s efforts to take down Hamas” sounds innocuous. The facts are that these “efforts” have cost the lives of over 50,000 civilians, 15,000 of them children. Gaza has been turned into a desert. Famine is once again threatening and Israel is gearing up for yet another push, ever narrowing the living space of Gazans.

This country has not only failed to censure Israel for its actions, but any demonstrations against them are deemed to be antisemitic and are condemned. And Israel is still supplied with weapons. As the international news agency Agence France-Presse reported in February: “The United States has announced the approval of the sale of more than $7.4 billion in bombs, missiles and related equipment to Israel, which has used American-made weapons to devastating effect during the war in Gaza.”

Violence has ever begotten violence. It is time that every effort is made to stop it and to find a solution that allows Israelis and Palestinians to coexist peacefully.

— Sabine Oishi, Baltimore

Collect unpaid taxes to balance budget

As President Donald Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” goes to the Senate, it is worth it to ponder a couple of numbers that aren’t in the bill: $1 trillion, the amount of taxes that go unpaid each year, much of it by the super rich, and $177 billion, which would raise all of America’s impoverished above the poverty level and would be a small part of that $1 trillion! Failing to give the IRS the wherewithal to collect those taxes makes no sense. There’s no reason for the United States to be in debt. We should have a balanced budget. We wouldn’t even have to raise taxes on the rich. Simply collect all the taxes due each year!

—Jim Dempsey, Edgewood