The Cupertino Courier

Letters & Opinions

Speak Out

'Hit' pieces
have no place
in a campaign

We were disappointed to see "hit'' pieces about certain candidates in the recent Cupertino election. We would ask that everyone campaign on a higher level in the future.

Sunnyvale's Campaign Ethics Guide states it very well. "If voters are adamant that they do not want to see attack-oriented campaigning and they back up those feelings with their votes on Election Day, then negative campaigning tactics will go away.''

We encourage voters to go to the League's nonpartisan website at www.smartvoter.org for balanced information on candidates.

Elaine Manley, president

League of Women Voters

Cohen's Vietnam
column had one
reader laughing

David Cohen's article ("Hanoi memories conflict with today's reality," Nov. 20) had me laughing when he stated a post-Christian Jane Fonda "repented for such deviltry" when she visited Hanoi during the Vietnam War.

I'm not sure where Mr. Cohen is getting his information, but in 1998 Jane Fonda admitted regret about visiting Hanoi during the Vietnam War. This is well before she became a Christian in 2001. As far as deviltry is concerned, the people who should have "repented" are the American politicians who escalated the war, which resulted in a total death count of 5.1 million Vietnamese and 58,000 Americans.

I know the reality of the Vietnam War doesn't make for good reading when Mr. Cohen expresses how great the shopping and golfing is today in Vietnam, but he should never forget the lives that were unnecessarily wasted even if he is enjoying the lush scenery on the back nine.

Mr. Cohen asks the question, "What will Baghdad and Kabul remind our now young people of in 40 years?" If the ultimate goal in Afghanistan and Iraq is to make them tourist destinations, then this country has truly lost its moral compass.

James Diaz

San Jose

Reader thinks
Cupertino center
looks 'pretty nice'

The Nov. 21 issue of the Courier includes campaign statements of the three city council candidates; two of them favor a so-called downtown area for our city. During my 47-year residency, this subject has come up many times.

It appears that what the people are referring to is an old-fashioned community center where neighbors can get together. Owing to the way Cupertino has developed, such a concept may not be possible, although all those coffee shops seem to serve the purpose.

We don't have a main street flavor, such as found in Los Altos, Mountain View or Los Gatos. The heart of town is the intersection of Stevens Creek and De Anza boulevards, extending a few blocks in all four directions. That area looks pretty nice to me. The critical element is traffic flow, which should not be restricted in any future developments along those main boulevards.

James L Wu

S. Tantau Avenue

Whittum's victory
tied to opposing
Mary Avenue plan

Congratulations to Dave Whittum for unseating incumbent Dean Chu in the November election. Whittum's success can be directly tied to his opposition of the Mary Avenue Extension over Highway 101 and 237, which is endorsed by the Jay Paul Company, developer of the Moffett Towers Project and a campaign contributor to Chu.

Residents of Sunnyvale West are united in their opposition to this 30-year-old plan, which would create an alternative expressway for Highway 85 and 237 commuters caught in increasing gridlock and flood a residential neighborhood with tens of thousands of additional cars.

The Sun quotes Councilman Chris Moylan's reaction to Chu's defeat with ''the community is unhappy with the council, and it's incumbent upon us to determine why.''

Perhaps the council should consider that Sunnyvale residents are distrustful of past council/developer relationships at the Town Center Redevelopment Project and irritated that these same people would consider a further sell-out to development pressures at our community's expense. It's as simple as this: Residents vote, developers don't.

Erik Hansen

Sunnyvale