Our Readers Write...or Wrong

Letters to the Editor

‘No’ to Bump-outsExplain it to me, please. I enthusiastically invite the city council to explain the obstruction being built on the corner of Foothill and Rinetti. This “bump-out” forces all bicycles into the traffic lane and into great danger.

Why would the city want to eliminate the areas where a bicycle commuter can ride? Will the city be liable if a cyclist is injured? Is the council aware that many people in La Cañada are avid cyclists, and a significant number actually commute by bicycle whenever weather permits?

My own bicycle commute (1 to 4 days a week) extends from Castle to Commonwealth. Going east, I have a clear path, but returning west, I am forced into traffic by the bump-out in front of Taylor’s.

Town council, please do not approve any more of these dangerous constructs. --Dr. Keith Serxner, La Cañada

Rise in Terrorism

Given the daily death toll in Iraq — of both American soldiers and innocent Iraqi — it was no surprise to see the L.A. Times headline: “U.S. Sees Rise in Terrorism Casualties.” Bush’s predetermined, ill-informed, morally indefensible decision to invade Iraq after 9/11, despite any connection between Iraq and the 9/11 attacks, has clearly made the U.S. and the rest of the world neither safer nor more secure. In fact it has created more U.S. enemies around the world and an ever-increasing death toll from terrorist attacks, especially in Iraq and Afghanistan. What is especially distressing is that there has been an 80% rise in the deaths of children by terrorists.

Does the fact that terrorists have not successfully attacked on U.S. soil since 9/11 somehow make Americans feel better about the carnage the Iraq war has brought about in the rest of the world? Are the deaths of 20,000 innocent people in 2006 acceptable to us because they were not Americans killed on U.S. soil? I hope not. --Mary Freeman, La Cañada