Make love, not war

Contra Costa Times



eEdition / Subscriber Services

Mobile


Mobile Alerts


RSS







News Photo Galleries

Obituaries

Crime & Courts

Bay Area

Breaking News

California

Politics - Local /State

Politics - National

Special Reports

Traffic

Weird

Weather





Publications Contra Costa Times

East County Times

San Ramon Valley Times

Tri-Valley Times

West County Times





My Town Alamo

Antioch

Brentwood

Concord

Contra Costa County

Danville

El Cerrito

Hercules

Lafayette

Martinez

Moraga

Oakley

Orinda

Pittsburg

Pleasant Hill

Richmond

San Ramon

Walnut Creek







Columns



Opinion Blogs

Editorials

Letters

Live Chats





Peninsula readers' letters: August 22



From Daily News Group readers



mercurynews.com

Posted:   08/21/2012 06:45:27 PM PDT

August 22, 2012 5:15 AM GMTUpdated:   08/21/2012 10:15:20 PM PDT



Eat healthy



Dear Editor: With the new school year just around the corner, parents' attention is turning to school clothes, supplies and lunches. Yes, school lunches.



Traditionally, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has used the National School Lunch Program as a dumping ground for surplus meat and dairy commodities. Not surprisingly, its own surveys indicate that children consume excessive amounts of animal fat and sugary drinks, to the point where one-third have become overweight or obese. Their early dietary flaws become lifelong addictions, raising their risk of diabetes, heart disease and stroke.



Gradually, the tide is turning. The department's new school lunch guidelines, mandated by President Barack Obama's Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, require doubling the servings of fruits and vegetables, more whole grains, less sodium and fat, and no meat for breakfast. Still, food lobbyists have prevailed on Congress to count pizza and French fries as vegetables, and fatty mystery meats and sugary dairy drinks abound.



Parents and students should consider healthy school lunch as a work in progress and insist on healthful plant-based school meals, snacks and vending machine items. Guidance is available at www.fns.usda.gov/cnd, www.healthyschoollunches.org, and www.vrg.org/family.

Peter Anatoli,







Palo Alto







War hysteria



Dear Editor: The war drums are beating again. Unconcerned with the chaos we have created in Iraq and Afghanistan, the pro-war letter-writing lobby and their media supporters are urging Israel to launch a pre-emptive strike on Iran. Unable to deliver a decisive blow on Iran's nuclear facility, Israel is using its U.S. proxies to drag us into another war. The timing is no accident. Israel hopes to exact an advantage from our preoccupation with the upcoming presidential election. Remember, Operation Cast Lead -- the pre-emptive attack on Gaza -- was carried out in December 2008 just before Obama's inauguration.



War hysteria can easily be amplified by false propaganda. How many members of Congress and the public were hoodwinked into believing Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction?



Ominously, Yedioth Ahronoth, Israel's largest selling daily newspaper, is predicting an imminent attack. The Israeli National News opposes such action, warning that "Israel is not a superpower." The former and current Israeli military establishment are vigorously opposed to an attack. Israel should heed the advice of Martin Dempsey, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, who warned that "a strike at this time would be destabilizing."



Jagjit Singh,



Los Altos







Make love, not war



Dear Editor: Men have been trying to change the world by violence, war and terror for thousands of years now, and the only changes have been bad ones -- which they just go on repeating war after war, year after year, century after century. You'd think they'd be ready to try love by now, since nothing else has worked.



But, sad to say, people just don't seem to learn from history -- or I should say the men who have run nations, kingdoms and empires haven't learned. If they'd had more women running things, they might have had more success. Women know how many years it takes to nurture, teach and raise a child, and are generally much more reluctant to send that child off to some stupid, pointless, vainglorious war where he'll wind up wounded or dead.



So make love and spread love and vote for love, not war.



Ted Rudow III, MA



Palo Alto