After reading the Feb.15 editorial “Maintaining a Democracy is not a Spectator Sport” by Mr. Steve Corbin professor emeritus from the University of Northern Iowa and the Feb. 17 editorial “Brenna Bird’s Words Don’t Match her Actions on Protection for Rape Victims” by Mr. Randy Evans executive director of the Iowa Freedom Of Information Council, there is a difference in the editorials!

I appreciate Professor Corbin’s use of Luthern Pastor Martin Niemoller’s famous dictum, but unlike Mr. Evans, he failed to put names to those who remain indifferent to the attacks that undermine our democratic process towards a true egalitarian society. I consider the major players in the business, political and religious communities who remain silent or indifferent to be Trojan Horses.

Mr. Evans aptly detailed the Trojan Horse, Iowa Republican Attorney General Breena Bird and her indifference towards victims of crime. We shouldn’t be surprised since she unashamedly, with a smile, shared the same political platform with a sex offender Donald Trump!

Ex-President Bill Clinton was a Trojan Horse when he signed into law NAFTA and he weakened the Glass-Steagall Act that allowed the banking community to engage in risky loaning!

Ex-Governor Terry Branstad, his Sec. of Agriculture Democrat Patty Judge and Democrat ex-Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller were Trojan Horses! Why? They failed to defend independent family farm livestock producers and all those tens of thousands of small town livestock suppliers all across Iowa. It was a hundreds of billion dollar business venture each year that kept mainstreet humming! Instead they allowed economic usurpers (giant agribusiness livestock producers and packers) to capture and destroy all that economic activity.

Donald Trump stood on the stage and mocked a disabled reporter. The Trojan Horses like Senators Grassley and Ernst, Gov. Kim Reynolds and legislators Jeff Edler and Dean Fisher should have booed and shamed Trump off the political stage never to hold public office again.

When Trump mocked U.S. soldiers who died on foreign soil, does the silence of Daniel J. Seehafer, National Commander of The American Legion, make him a Trojan Horse? Trump was essentially mocking one of our most treasured national monuments, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

Beware: Trump is a classic Trojan Horse who not only undermines democracy but just plain ole common decency. I hope Prof. Corbin understands the importance of calling out the Trojan Horses.