Letters to the Editor Letters to the Editor (October 21, 2005)

Sally Ride not the first

Editor:

Regarding your recent article featuring the astronaut Sally Ride ("Science girls blast off," Oct. 7), Sally Ride is not "the first woman ever to fly into space." Before her, Valentina Tereshkova, in 1963, and Svetlana Savitskaya, in 1982 -- both Russians -- flew into space.

Sally Ride can be correctly referred to as "the first American woman ever to fly into space." Alex Babanin Middlefield Road

Bubb students walking and biking

Editor:

Wednesday, Oct. 5 was International Walk to School Day, and students at Bubb Elementary School showed that Mountain View residents love walking and biking when almost 70 percent of the more than 500 students at the school either walked or biked.

Students, parents and teachers enjoyed a morning full of activities sponsored by the Mountain View Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee (BPAC) and the Bubb PTA. That morning, after breakfast snacks donated by local companies, they talked with BPAC members and Mountain View School Resource Officer Lloyd Curns about pedestrian and bicycle safety.

In an assembly, Officer Curns talked to students about the benefits of walking and biking and gave important safety tips. Students were visibly proud when Mayor Matt Neely congratulated them on their dedication to walking and biking and doing it safely.

The two classes with the highest proportion of students walking and biking won a special lunch party, and enjoyed sandwiches donated by Subway. Those two classes had over 95 percent of their students walking or biking! As part of the festivities, students drew pictures in response to the question, "Why are walking and biking fun?" Their drawings will be on display at City Hall until Oct. 28.

When Officer Curns asked students why they should walk, students responded enthusiastically, "So you don't pollute!" and, "So you don't get overweight!" Students have the right idea -- let's keep walking and biking, Mountain View.

For more information on Walk to School Day, please visit www.walktoschool.org. Heather Hough Showers Drive

Talk at Books, Inc. on ending war

Editor:

Throughout much of my adult life, about six decades, I have been puzzled by the negative phenomenon where almost everyone I know and/or have listened to avoids discussing political alternatives to what some call the "War System."

Since the beginning of humankind, society has clung to the mental set that war is and always will be inevitable. Even in this 21st century it is very easy to sense the reluctance to tinker with the vision of a global solution that could actually do away with murderous war.

Or, maybe the procrastinators are just our industrialized citizenry who have enjoyed the luxury of material wealth and virtual insulation from the miseries of war.

Whatever the case, we often read and hear about things like "just wars," but almost never about how wars could be effectively ruled out. However, at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 28 at Books, Inc. in Mountain View, California poet, author, publisher and political activist Byron Belitsos will engage in a discussion on anarchy, demagoguery, sovereignty, government, nationalism and other war-related issues. The session will be at a book-signing event during which he will also answer questions about "One World Democracy," which he and psychologist Jerry Tetalman recently co-authored.

Prospects look good that on that evening, a number of local thinkers will meet and talk with Belitsos about the possibilities of replacing the deeply traditional "War System" with sanity, civility and justice, i.e., a process capable of attaining real world peace.

I'll be there. Fred Duperrault W. Middlefield Road

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