Sir,—I read Mr Graham’s assessment of the United States, ‘The scorpion and the frog’ (HI 34.3, May/June 2026), with a profound sense of sadness. While the US is guilty of many sins—recounted in condescending detail by Mr Graham—the history of the United States is far more balanced than he would lead us to believe.
Mr Graham reminded us of US aggression during the Mexican War, the brutality of nineteenth-century colonial expansion and the authoritarian impulses of the current administration, but somehow he missed Tom Paine, the US rejection of monarchy and the consequential rise of self-government, the unprecedented 1787 concept of constitutional liberty, the refuge provided to more than one million Irish during and following the Famine, the sustained US aid to the heroes of 1916, the essential US role in defeating the Nazis, the generosity of the Marshall Plan, and the resolute US deterrence of Soviet aggression throughout the long decades of the Cold War. More recently, without the early aid of the United States, Ukraine would have been brutally crushed by Putin.
In its misleading simplicity, Mr Graham’s editorial note was an unjust and shallow depiction of the United States—and a disservice to the complexity of political history.—Respectfully,
PAUL McHALE
North Carolina, USA
Former member of Congress, 1993–9
Maynooth University MA (History) 2022
In fact, I did refer to the positive legacy of the US as a refuge for the oppressed. And many of the topics ‘missed’ in my short editorial—‘Tom Paine, the US rejection of monarchy and the consequential rise of self-government, the unprecedented 1787 concept of constitutional liberty’—were addressed in the following July/August issue.—Ed.