Joe Biden needs to step aside and put his country first

Letters to the editor: our readers share their views. Please send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

Time to quit? President Biden has dismissed calls for him to stand aside, but doubts remain about whether he is up to the task (Getty)

Time is rapidly running out for gaffe-prone Joe Biden to rescue his presidency. In calling President Zelensky “Putin” and vice-president Kamala Harris “Trump”, he has only added to a sense that the Democrats are hurtling towards an electoral meltdown in November.

Yet for all Biden’s gaffes, what also came out in the long, unscripted press conference was his overall decency and commitment to liberal democratic values, including his robust defence of Nato and steadfast support for Ukraine. His legislative pace and achievements are almost without precedent and, under Biden, post-Covid America is once again the West’s economic powerhouse.

Continuing his campaign risks all of this and allows for the domestic and international turmoil a second Donald Trump presidency will bring.

Perhaps the only workable compromise that can keep the Democratic Party united is for the ticket to be reversed, so that Harris becomes the presidential nominee and Biden her vice-presidential nominee. A preposterous idea perhaps, but other US vice-presidents have served well into their seventies and lived into their late eighties or nineties.

Paul Dolan

Northwich

A ‘get out of jail free’ card is no solution

The justice secretary is considering releasing prisoners from jails to solve overcrowding problems.

Initially, this sounds good: let out a few of the “nicer” ones so the “nasty” ones can stay behind bars. But then again, how many people are imprisoned for minor offences?

The same logic could be applied to hospitals, by sending home anyone who has been there for more than three days so that new cases could be admitted, thus reducing the waiting list.

Schools could expel the weaker students as they won’t go to university and it will encourage them to look for work, maybe?

Look for real solutions, please.

Dennis Fitzgerald

Melbourne

The beautiful game has an ugly side

Thank you to The Independent for highlighting the distressing relationship between football and domestic abuse. We often talk about the toxic culture of football when it comes to fan violence, yet we rarely see a spotlight on the violence women suffer once the “beautiful game” is over.

As England head to the Euros final, we cannot ignore this issue any longer – we need players, captains and sponsors to speak out.

Moreover, we need fans to look at their own behaviour. It seems acceptable nowadays to abandon any restraint or emotional regulation when watching a match. It is surely no surprise that the legitimisation of such heightened emotions will eventually bear dire consequences, especially given that football, in the UK, is still unable to shake the misogynistic culture that has poisoned it for years.

Tracey Martel

Oxford

‘First past the post’ is not fit for purpose

I was always a firm believer in proportional representation, and the idea that the amount of votes a party gets should reflect the makeup of the House of Commons.

However, it was a conversation with my friend – who likes our “current first-past-the-post system” – that made me rethink my stance. He argued that the current system, although flawed, can lead to governments getting things done and stop the country from being stuck in a political standstill with coalition governments falling apart.

I suggested a system of single transferable vote, similar to the one that’s currently used in Labour Party leadership elections. The use of an STV system would maintain the link between constituencies and their MPs. But it would also allow people who vote for the candidate with the lowest share of the votes to then transfer their vote to their second preference, meaning their vote is still counted.

The likelihood of any meaningful change to the voting system is unclear, but perhaps this new government will see an opportunity to compromise. No matter where you stand on the matter, I’m sure we can all agree any kind of electoral reform is needed.

Ross Tyrkot

Hampshire