Re: “After trying to overturn his election loss in 2018, Poliquin won’t say if he’ll respect the results this year” (Oct. 9):

With the midterms looming and polls showing Republican candidates closing the gap in states where Democrats have led all summer, it appears that Democrats have pivoted from a single-issue strategy – women’s reproductive rights – to a more broad-based campaign. Recognizing that the electorate, for the most part, is focused on inflation, crime and immigration, the shift seemed prudent. But was it? Is it possible the Democrats were on the right track with a single-issue gambit, but they focused on the wrong matter in question?

Polls throughout the summer showed that the perceived deterioration of democracy in America was resonating with a majority of the electorate, but then in late June, the Supreme Court overturned the longstanding constitutional right to an abortion, reversing Roe v. Wade, and Democrats, with an air of bravado, went all in.

Changing course again may be too little, too late, but if Republicans, with their assemblage of election deniers, are voted into office, especially in Congress, then democracy may be at risk of collapse, rendering all else subordinate.

Jane Larkin
Tampa, Fla.