How not to protect a president: Let him ride a bike

Biden fell off his bike in June

Letter to the editor in today's NY Times:

Re “No Fuss for Biden, Just Sun and Peace” (Kiawah Island Memo, Aug. 17):

As a survivor of a bike crash in which a bicycle helmet most likely saved my life, I was stunned to see a photograph of the president of the United States, of all people, riding on a beach, wearing a baseball cap instead of protective headgear.

Where was the Secret Service to intervene and insist on a bike helmet for President Biden? Based on the photographic evidence, it seems that the president’s own security detail was without a helmet, too.

Protecting presidential documents is a national security issue, for sure; protecting a president’s noggin surely should be one, too.

Tom Goodman

New York

See also Bikes and the illusion of safety, Steven Pinker on the risks of riding a bike and The Harvard Health Letter on cycling.

Rob's comment:

It's particularly irresponsible to encourage children to ride bikes in the city---or anywhere, for that matter: See Getting children on bikes and Indoctrinating children in cycling as a "lifestyle."