Donald Trump’s press conference was less diplomacy, more pantomime (“‘You’re hurting Australia’: Trump threatens ABC journalist in fiery clash”, smh.com.au, September 17). When veteran and respected journalist John Lyons asked calm, reasonable questions, Trump, the playground dobber, sneered and threatened to “report him” to Albanese – already well aware of what the world knows. Trump is a greedy, narcissistic buffoon incapable of facing scrutiny. Smearing Lyons online later as a “foreign fake news loser” only highlighted Trump’s desperation. The contrast is stark: one man pursues truth with dignity; the other flails in ego and buffoonery. History will remember who is who. Vivien Clark-Ferraino, Duckmaloi

Thank you, John Lyons, for showing the world (and Americans in particular) how it’s done. The only way to expose deceit is to confront it head on and call it out. Mark Paskal, Austinmer

Trump’s threat to “tell on” John Lyons to Albanese indicates yet again the Trump mindset. “Truth is what I say it is and you must kiss my posterior if you want to get on,” is his normal attitude. In this, he is backed up to the hilt by his intellectually challenged White House gang, to whom truth is an equally foreign thing. We do not need Trump, particularly if the relationship with him is to be a Faustian one. We have already put our national soul in serious peril, following the US into Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq. It is time to call a halt to all of this sycophantic grovelling. With luck, Albanese will get similar treatment to that meted out to Zelensky in the Oval Room, and Australia will never go anywhere near the US again. Ian Usman Lewis, Armidale

Australia should be proud that John Lyons asked questions that the local American journalists are too frightened to ask. It just proves that when Trump is asked a legitimate question, on how much his (Trump’s) wealth has increased while he is president, he lashes out and threatens Lyons, telling him that he will tell Albanese about this. Let’s hope that Albanese supports Lyons and promotes the Four Corners program about the increased wealth of Trump. Robert Pallister, Punchbowl

Given the US President’s ongoing lies and bully boy behaviour, I hope the prime minister and foreign minister convey to Washington the diplomatic message equivalent of “F— off”. Australia, like the rest of the world, has until the next US presidential election until we can all move on, hopefully with rational adults to deal with. In the meantime, sideline the petulant child and let him play in a corner on his own. The rest of the world will manage. Indeed, the silver lining to his behaviour is that countries are looking elsewhere for support in all areas, thus reducing reliance on America and reducing American influence in the world. David Dilley, Harris Park

Has the US president finally committed to a meeting with PM Albanese – to threaten Albo to “quiet” the Australian media if Australians “want to get along with” him? Albo must reject a censorial dictate from a leader who ignores his own nation’s First Amendment right to free speech and aggressively attempts to silence US journalists through obstruction, belittlement and litigation. Nell Knight, Avoca Beach

Not content will telling other countries how much to spend on their defence, now Donald Trump is telling the foreign press what questions they cannot ask. Like a “dobber” school child, he has threatened to tell our prime minister about an ABC journalist who asked some probing questions about his money-making schemes as US president. Trump is eviscerating any section of America’s media which dares to criticise him. The man has no principles and no moral compass other than self-interest. Australia’s freedom of the press is a cornerstone of our democracy. We must continue to support journalists who have the courage and moral integrity to do their job properly, without fear or favour. Rob Phillips, North Epping

Gun lobby silencer

It is unlikely that an American newspaper would ever take the risk of publishing the comment by Michael Koziol (“US ignores elephant in room over Kirk’s death”, September 17). The response would almost certainly be rabid accusations from multiple players that the publisher is a radical left-wing organisation bent on disarming the American people. The American gun lobby has effectively silenced any criticism. Pity the American people. Glenn Johnson, Leura

Michael Koziol’s remarks on the striking absence of discussion of US gun laws in US political talk shows following the murder of Charlie Kirk comes as no surprise to me. In 1992, I worked in Kennesaw, Georgia, a peaceful, affluent university town, where it was and still is law that every household head must “maintain a firearm” (which I never did). It may be that the Camelot of Kennesaw is the kind of image of gun-bearing America that is embedded in the unconscious of many of them, especially Republicans and National Rifle Association members. This enables them to disregard the historical context of the US Second Amendment and see it as a divinely revealed obligation. They argue that despite some 46,000 people dying each year in the US from firearm related causes, the US is still made safer by gun ownership. When there is a US president who uses reasoning based on facts rather than emotion fuelled by myth to inform their decision-making then there may be some progress. Paul Casey, Callala Bay

Climate puzzle

What is it about certain members of the Opposition that so terrifies them about striving for the aspirational target of net zero emissions by 2050 (“Ley feels the heat as Coalition erupts over goals for climate change”, September 17)? This lot can’t even wait for the review of their existing policy commissioned by their own party. And even if a reduction in carbon in our atmosphere defies all the accepted science and fails to abate our changing climate, surely a less polluted environment for our future generations to breathe has to be a good thing anyway? It’s still a win. And just think of all those new jobs that will be created, replacing a working life inhaling coal dust. I have racked my brain trying to come up with a possible reason for their trenchant opposition to the target. Surely it couldn’t be to just create a point of difference between them and the government? No, couldn’t be. Could it? Bill Young, Killcare Heights

It seems the federal No-alition has found its ground zero. Already near the point of electoral irrelevance, the move to abandon net zero could bring the whole Coalition edifice crumbling down. With the publication of the National Climate Risk Assessment, there can be no further doubt that Australia, along with the rest of the world, needs to act immediately and strongly cut greenhouse gas emissions. The imperative of net zero is a given and the sooner it is achieved the better, if the world is to avoid catastrophic climate change and ecological breakdown. Australia’s energy security is now in renewables. We have huge resources in solar and wind. A golden opportunity lies before us in sustainable energy supply as the world moves away from fossil fuels. We simply can’t afford to let closed minds and self-focused egos destroy Australia’s future. Meredith Williams, Baulkham Hills

Kirk should not be seen as a hero

Jenna Price is right (“Speak ill of the dead? Yes, we can”, September 17). Charlie Kirk seems to have been a hateful person and that shouldn’t be sugar-coated just because he’s dead. He was also an advocate for gun ownership and held the Second Amendment as sacrosanct– this amendment was ratified in 1791 and the sentence that includes the right to bear arms opens with “well-regulated militia”. Kirk and the like consistently leave that bit out, they also ignore the historic context that it was about small communities defending themselves from gun-slinging outlaws with their own well-regulated members. History has been rewritten, we should not allow Kirk’s life and death to be rewritten too. Lucy France, Cronulla

A tragic death doesn’t make Charlie Kirk a hero. Kirk preached racism, white supremacy, Islamophobia and homophobia. He was a proponent of free speech but used the privilege to incite hatred and division. Violent deaths are abhorrent, but so is evil. Kirk hid behind the mantel of Christianity, and MAGA supporters would have us believe he was a martyr. However, they seem more focused on implicating the Democrats in his death, than on mourning the loss of their hero. Political violence and assassinations are not new to the US. However, America now has a president who actively stokes the flames of political unrest and division. It’s hard to be hopeful for America, considering the lax gun laws and growing unrest across the country. Arguably, the US has become even less safe since Donald Trump’s return to the White House. Graham Lum, North Rocks

Students of history may know about Nazi storm trooper Horst Wessel, killed in 1930 and immortalised in Nazi propaganda as a martyr to the fascist cause. Charlie Kirk is rapidly becoming the new Horst Wessel. John Bailey, Canterbury

Thank you, Jenna Price, for your words of wisdom. These are truly worrying times, which require all of us to pay heed with our thoughts and actions. Wendy Howard, Quakers Hill

UTS told to ‘shape-up’

I am horrified to read that some degrees at UTS are to be shut down (“Plan to shut down UTS uni degrees”, September 17). Education is the way forward for societies, so to shut down institutions such as this is, literally, going backwards. If funding is the issue, why don’t some of our multimillionaires put their collective monies together in order for educational institutions to flourish instead of building another personal mega mansion? Would it not be a more satisfying and benevolent use of excess money and having the institution called by the donor’s name? Dorothy Gliksman, Cedar Brush Creek

The contempt shown by UTS management with the bald statement of “your positions are no longer required” is staggering. Maybe it is time for the Federal Education Minister to call them to Canberra and advise them that the university is a drain on the public purse and is no longer required. Michael Blissenden, Dural

As hard a pill as this will be to swallow, I think it is a good thing for UTS to shrink its footprint. I am a Sydney Uni graduate, and while I have only been in the workforce for a few years, my bachelor’s degree has not helped for the most part. I feel a big mismatch exists between the perceived employability of a university degree and the expectations of hiring managers for entry-level roles. I did an arts degree majoring in economics and project management, yet I started my graduate career in an accounting stream, and am now transitioning to technology after developing an interest in data analytics. My degree did not help me stand out, is barely applicable in my work, and I am saddled with a load of debt that in hindsight I could have done without. Naosheyrvaan Nasir, Quakers Hill

What Christian values?

Pamela Graham (Letters, September 17) reminds us what Christianity is supposedly all about as so many so-called Christians are into espousing vengeance, material desires and violence as a valid way of life, especially in gun-soaked America. Whether one is a believer in religion or not, one can imagine Jesus watching the world unfold oblivious to his teachings of love, compassion and kindness, saying to himself despairingly “That’s not what I meant”. Judy Finch, Taree

The price of life

Your correspondent (Letters, September 17) says we can’t quantify the value of a life. In fact, the value is routinely quantified in insurance policies and more particularly in economic assessments of infrastructure projects, not withstanding that economists often have heated battles about what those values should be. But he’s right, of course, at the personal level and especially when it comes to one’s self-assessment of the value of my life being way above what the rest of society would put on me. Peter Thornton, Killara

A thousand words

I could not keep my eyes off George Lipman’s acclaimed 1967 photograph of Victor Hookey and Mark Anthony (“Herald photographer who took iconic image dies”, September 17). Two beautiful friends. Great photos do “speak a thousand words”. As noted at the time, it “captured our country’s optimism”. We must find this optimism once more, and photographers like George can indeed help us do this. Vale. Lisa Williams, Dulwich Hill

Sydney of the future

It is fortuitous that Sydney is building a western airport (Letters, September 17), as the current one and its approaches are forecast to be underwater in a couple of decades. It’s a shame that so much was spent on providing new roads to Sydney Airport that could have been spent elsewhere. Colin Sutton, Newtown

Other cities have walking tunnels under them, such as Montreal, so that their citizens don’t have to suffer freezing temperatures. It seems timely that we are talking about underground tunnels in Sydney while temperatures are rising so much that in a few years we won’t be able to survive out in the streets. Margaret Grove, Concord

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