Olympic Cover

To the Editors:

What a cover photograph! Never before have my eyes enjoyed such a pure quintessence in harmony, reality, perfection and effort as shown in the picture of Eric and Beth Heiden [Feb. 11].

Fabio A. Ridolfi Toronto

As models of perseverance and charisma, the Heidens have become towers of inspiration at home and pillars of diplomacy abroad. Win, place or show in Lake Placid, the Heidens rank at the top of living sports legends.

John Westman Hamilton, N. Y.

Tai Babilonia and Randy Gardner are like thunder and lightning put together--electric! Watching them skate makes you proud they're Americans.

Sonja M. Larson Stanhope, Iowa

The Soviets Irina Rodnina and Alexander Zaitsev certainly are not "uninspired." They are the best pair-skating team ever to take the ice.

Peggy Cote Baltimore

Before yanking the Olympics off to sanctified Greece, look at your Thucydides, wherein you'll find that in 420 B.C. guards were used at Olympia, ostensibly to prevent an "invasion" by Spartans, who had been barred from the Games, allegedly for violating an Olympic truce. Purity has always been in short supply, and history does indeed seem to repeat itself. Jack C. Rossetter Elmwood Park, Ill.

Debate About the Draft

Being eligible for the proposed draft [Feb. 11], I rue the possiblity of fighting and perhaps dying in an increasingly imminent military conflict. However, we can show the Kremlin that all young Americans can and will go to any lengths to ensure our nation's freedom. By starting the draft now in peacetime, we won't be forced to start it in wartime.

Jeffrey Hagerty Chicago

They can take every car in the Gordon family and all the oil and gas that go with them, but they cannot have my son.

Kathy Gordon Dallas

Since I am a student at the New York State Maritime College, it is almost inevitable that I will be in the midst of danger should a war break out. I feel the youth of this nation must defend the beliefs and security of America from Soviet aggression, but I do not feel women should be registered for the draft.

William J. Ruh Orchard Park, N. Y.

Once again old men talk of sending young men to war. With war mechanized, there is no valid reason why only young, poor men should serve. AU citizens between 18 and 62 should be subject to a random draft. Only the severely handicapped should be exempt. We might all be less inclined to rattle sabers if we thought we had to carry one into battle.

Carl O. Olson Fredonia, N. Y.

Where Are the Allies?

In early January, when Australia's Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser announced a hard-line policy toward the Soviets over their invasion of Afghanistan (including a proposed Olympic Games boycott as well as trade sanctions), he was accused of making Australia more important than it really is. Since we didn't rate a mention in your article "Where Are Allies When Needed?" [Feb. 4], maybe in the eyes of the U.S. we really are "the mouse that roared."

Wendy Maloney Montmorency, Australia

You stated that France, Germany and Italy did not express much solidarity with Carter's sanctions against the Soviets. I believe Western Europe should be independent of superpower rivalry and try--by any means--to preserve world peace, even if some American people, misunderstanding our subtle diplomacy, call it cowardly abdication.

Sylvie Lamarque Gif-sur-Yvette, France

Drawing Some Parallels

If the Soviet move into Afghanistan [Feb. 11] is reminiscent of Hitler's annexation of Austria, then the present U.S. policy of forging a closer alliance with Communist China has its parallel in the panicked alliance of the Western powers with the Soviet Union to crush Nazi Germany. The current might of the Soviet Union owes much to this alliance during the second World War when the Soviets obtained valuable weapons and technology from the West. Even more deplorable was the consequent vassalization of Eastern Europe by the U.S.S.R., unchecked by the Western Allies.

If China, with U.S. collaboration, attains superpower status, will her weaker neighbors be left to pay the same price?

Dev Gupta Tucson

It ill behooves the U.S. to take a holier-than-thou attitude toward the Soviets and to spearhead a drive to boycott the Games in Moscow. The Soviet Union isn't guilty of doing anything in Afghanistan that we haven't already done in Viet Nam on a far grander scale.

Victor A. Rudowski Clemson, S.C.

Pitch for the Cathode Church

The money-changers in the temple were born 2,000 years too soon. Otherwise they could have learned from "Stars of the Cathode Church" [Feb. 4] how to burnish their image.

Establish a Good Temple Seal of Approval and issue a list of Honest Hucksters for the Kingdom. Pitch the line fast so nobody inquires whose kingdom.

Roland A. White Champaign, Ill.

There are quacks on every hand but, praise God, bona fide men of God make up your "Stars of the Cathode Church." Power? Yes--the power of God released daily to transform lives.

(Mrs.) Virginia W. Johnston Hillpoint, Wis.

How much money is taken in every year by the narcotics pushers, makers of pornographic movies and writers of material that debases the human being? And you have the audacity to criticize the radio and TV evangelists for the money they have collected to preach God's holy word?

Faith McDuffie Tuscaloosa, Ala.

The political power obtained by television preachers scares me. Perhaps a new constitutional amendment is needed to protect the state from the church.

Mark C. Droffner Durham, N.C.

A Breach of Ethics

I agree with Drs. Curran and Cass-cells [Feb. 4] that for physicians to be involved in administering lethal injections in cases of capital punishment "would constitute a cruel and unusual breach of medical ethics." The Hippocratic oath--already eroded by legalized abortion --would be further undercut, and the physician's historic mission as healer would again be compromised by such a death-dealing task.

John Jefferson Davis Hamilton, Mass.

Up with Schmertz

Up with fables, up with Mobil, up with Herbert Schmertz [Feb. 11]. I have been highly entertained and intellectually stimulated by these clever commercials. Edward and Mrs. Simpson is excellent; the commercials are better.

Carol Stivers Ripley, Ohio

What burns me about the fabulous Mobil ads is that they perpetuate the popular myth that "the Government is our enemy and business is our friend." I would like equal time to suggest that if you have to trust your fate to either the Feds or to Mobil, choose the Feds.

Vance Hansen Phoenix

I was appalled by the Washington Post-Newsweek broadcast group's statement that "controversial issues should be dealt with in our news and public affairs program" in response to Mobil's advocacy commercials. This is surely restriction of expression by the media. They wish to impose their censorship on a company (Mobil) that wishes to defend itself.

Brian D. Briscoe Baltimore

Flora's Help

It is interesting that one of the leading figures in the recent escape of the six Americans from Iran [Feb. 11] is Canada's Secretary for External Affairs, Flora MacDonald. That is the same name as that Highland Scot who assisted Bonnie Prince Charlie in his escape from the clutches of the English after his aborted rebellion in 1745.

Douglas H. Worthington Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio

Priests and Wine

The picture of the archbishop mixing his cocktails [Feb. 4] reminds me of my Kabul days when, soon after Japan entered the war, the wine stocks of our Japanese legation became dangerously low. Yet at the Italian legation wine still flowed. I asked his Italian excellency if he had a pipeline to Rome, and he replied: "We've better than that: we have priests, and Afghanistan has grapes."

Lillias Katsube Kobe, Japan

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