Another view on Sheldon Silver

Bronx: Re the scheduled retrial of former Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver on corruption charges: It was apparently legal for Silver to collect referral fees, based upon referrals from Dr. Robert Taub, to a law firm associated with Silver. Silver had many good reasons to arrange grants to the cancer research group associated with Taub, which seemed to merit the awards. Silver himself is a cancer survivor. Silver and Taub are friends of long standing, and provided each other with gifts and favors. In genuine friendships, there is no balance sheet or quid pro quo. Often, gratitude is the only return for providing favors to a friend.

Arranging the funding of Taub’s cancer research group seems legal as long as it wasn’t specifically and narrowly a payback for the legal referral fees to Silver that Taub generated. From Taub’s testimony, it seems that there was not specifically an exchange of favors. Accordingly, Silver would have arranged funding for the cancer research group, even if he did not receive legal referral fees. Lewis E. Hyman

One and only one language

Clifton, N.J.: Congratulations to Voicer Ardina Cerra. I am tired of hearing gibberish spoken everywhere. American English should be the national language. Speak whatever your language is at home. In public, speak only American English if you can learn it or do not speak in public at all. I know this letter is harsh, but after coming here to take advantage of all the possibilities it is only fair to learn American English.

Alice J. Dymek

One and only one team

Jersey City: To Voicer Justo Edwards: Mets fans do not root for the 666 Yankees at all! Were you brainwashed by that bigmouth inbred Craig Carton with his moronic “Mets fans for Yankees” garbage? We stay loyal to the orange and blue 24/7/365, playoffs or not, and that means you can tell the Stankees and their mostly arrogant, loudmouth fan base some choice words you can’t print in the Daily News. Since 1962, rooting for the Mets has built character. Rooting for the Bronx evil empire is like rooting for the pedophile on “Dateline NBC.” Joseph Piro

Shave, guys

Brooklyn: To Voicer John F. Dennehy: Major League Baseball must set tougher rules. The ball players belong in cages — Dodgers Clayton Kershaw, Justin Turner and Kenley Jansen, the Astros’ Evan Gattis and Brian McCann, the Rockies’ Charlie Blackmon and many more. These players look like gorillas. So do some of their managers. Their pig habits, spitting, blowing bubbles like little girls and chewing gum during the national anthem. What a disgrace. We must go back to the ’40s and ’50s, when baseball players looked like humans.

Richard Martin

Get it now?

Queens Village: To all the white Voicers, especially Dale Leshaw, who are outraged over black athletes kneeling during the national anthem: If this were a majority black country and black cops were killing innocent whites over and over again and getting away with it, then don’t tell us you would complain about white athletes kneeling and protesting the same way black athletes are doing now. It’s time to cut the hypocritical, sickening, self-righteous, judgmental crap and try to understand where the other side is coming from. Harry Aydinian

Out of control

Staten Island: So they want to take down all the statues. What’s next — changing the colors of the American flag to red, white and black? When is it going to stop? Wake up, America.

James Matthews

Two tragedies

Brooklyn: To Voicer Linda Smith: Mayor de Blasio was wearing a pin of Puerto Rico which is part of the United States. In these troubled times, it is not demeaning to the rest of the United States to keep in mind the troubles that are going on in another part of our United States of America. There is a lot of suffering going on and we can’t forget one thing while another thing is happening. Suffering is suffering, whether it be caused by weather or demented humans. Mayor de Blasio tried to pay respect to both tragedies that both took place the United States. I am not a fan of de Blasio, but I’m not going to bash the man because he wears a pin that helps him keep Puerto Rico in his mind.

Barbara R. Lee

Wrong and wrong

Bronx: We now know that White House Chief of Staff John Kelly is both a liar and racist, as is his boss, the lying, racist Donald Trump. Kelly actually said one should compromise about slavery when talking about traitorous Gen. Robert E. Lee.

Juanita M. Johnson

On defense

Saddle Brook, N.J.: How to solve the North Korea problem: What’s needed is a policy that would allow South Korea and Japan to be in a position to mutually destroy North Korea. The U.S. should lend South Korea and Japan tactical nuclear weapons under their control. If South Korea and Japan are attacked by North Korea in any way, they could use their nuclear weapons without U.S. permission. China would not like this situation. The U.S. should tell China that if they can get North Korea to destroy their nuclear arsenal, then the U.S. will get back the weapons it lent to South Korea and Japan.

Angelo Rufrano

A radioactive question

Landsdowne, Pa.: Just asking: Where does North Korea’s uranium come from? Is America’s uranium that Hillary Clinton and the Obama administration sold Russia access to in turn going to North Korea? Georgia Makiver

Kudos to Kurds

Oakland Gardens: The Kurds had a referendum to declare independence from Iraq, which passed with 90% approval. Many allies and our State Department have expressed opposition to this move, claiming it’s bad timing since our main objective right now is unity in fighting ISIS. But Kurdistan has supported the U.S. since the height of the Cold War even as Iraq and many Arab countries leaned toward the Soviet Union and battled the Jewish state. The world watched as Saddam Hussein conducted an ethnic cleansing campaign with chemical weapons against them. They bravely survived and continued to fight against all the evil factions of radical Islam. Kurdistan is a true beacon of hope in the Middle East and is an inspiration to all those who cherish freedom. They deserve the support of the United States. Constance Dowd

Let them roam

Darien, Conn.: Kudos to the NY Daily News for running an Op-Ed about the plight of America’s wild horses (“Congress targets our wild horses,” Nov. 1). The one point missing is they don’t need to be “managed” because they are not overpopulated. Increasingly commercialized public lands are the real problem. Wild horses have lost 41% of their habitat since the passage of the Wild Horse and Burro Act of 1971. Today, upwards of 2 million cattle graze public lands, and the government has authorized thousands of oil, gas and mineral extraction projects on these areas as well. Fiscal concerns with the wild horse program are overblown. The budget has increased to $75.7 AP PHOTO/SETH WENIG million, but that’s just a fraction of the Department of Interior’s budget. One way to bring down costs would be to allow wild horses to be returned to states where wild horses once roamed but have been wiped out — Missouri, Iowa, Arkansas, Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas. Another would be to restrict cattle and sheep ranchers from grazing in wild horse areas. Priscilla Feral, president

Friends of Animals

Listen to community boards

Monroe Township, N.J.: Re “Blaz Rx for city’s clogged arteries” (Oct. 23): Our local community boards were way ahead of the mayor years ago. Community boards were started to take advantage of professional expertise of our own which we believed would cure our traffic and other problems. That’s what our Brooklyn borough president, the Honorable Abe Stark, told me when I met him in his clothing store on Pitkin Ave. when I was shopping for a top coat. I was told to select 10 people to start the first community boards in Brooklyn, with the knowledge to begin the future of their communities on traffic, parks, roads and swimming pools, interested in the future of Brooklyn and helping it grow. I guess I took him too seriously and was thanked by him many times as the chairman of Community Board 2. I’m now retired at age 92. Mayor, listen to your community boards — maybe you could learn something.

Rocco Roy G. Vanasco