Letters to the Editor
Ancient heiau site in Hawai'i Kai ignored
I am writing out of concern for an old heiau in Hawai'i Kai, located near the post office in a vacant lot mauka of Hawai'i Kai Drive. There also are remnants of an old village.
During the construction of the Kalele Kai condominiums, this once-great heiau was desecrated. Today only a piece of it and parts of a village still stand, covered by heavy kiawe brush.
I noticed that construction is slated for this area. Coincidently, this is the same spot that the Verizon telephone lines were accidentally severed by the contractor setting up dust screens for construction.
Library records tell of this heiau reaching from the post office to the edge of the waterfront. Today all that remains is a little section, maybe 45 feet. It is under discarded construction materials.
I'm Hawaiian and live in this area. It pains me to see that nothing is or was ever done to protect this heiau or the remains of this village. The purpose in writing this is to inform people who can make a difference and protect this ancient site so that our history and culture are preserved and not sold to the highest bidder.
John DeLima
Hogue just a lot of wind in hurricane fund debate
While falsely accusing all Democrats of "raiding" the Hawai'i Hurricane Relief Fund, GOP Sen. Bob Hogue, in his May 4 letter, never explained why his idea of abolishing the fund and disbursing its monies to less than 60 percent of its contributors would have served a greater public purpose than encouraging pro-active hurricane protection practices.
Instead, he blithely ignores the compelling case for hurricane hazard mitigation presented by Gerald Peters in a April 22 letter to your paper, "We can't let hurricane relief fall prey to politics."
From the moment SB 838 and its companion HB 1156 were introduced, House Democrats consistently opposed what Sen. Hogue termed "interest-siphoning flaws." After SB 838 crossed over from the Senate, the House amended the bill to remove those "flaws," a position that was ultimately adopted in conference with the Senate. Meanwhile, Republicans showed tremendous inconsistency in their own individual votes on the measure, voting one way in committee, then another on the House floor.
Not only did Democrats preserve the integrity of the Hurricane Relief Fund, we also met all budget priorities and mandates without "raid(ing) dozens of special funds to finance union pay raises ... " as Sen. Hogue so purposefully but incorrectly stated. All these facts can be easily verified online at the state Legislature's Web site: www.capitol.hawaii.gov/
Sen. Hogue seeks nothing more than to exploit the average citizen's lack of knowledge about the legislative process for partisan advantage. But no amount of political preening and posturing can disguise the fact that, just like his position on public employee health benefits, he once again finds himself championing the wrong side of a very pertinent and necessary piece of legislation.
Rep. Marcus R. Oshiro
House Majority Leader, 40th District (Wahiawa-Whitmore Village)
Media should stop focusing on violence
It is annoying that in the May 12 article "International meetings will pay off," the media keep dwelling on the violence of Seattle.
Thousands of protesters and civil society members produced an unprecedented show of people power through diversity and solidarity, with a few violent protesters giving a feast for lazy journalism. The big scoop was inside the WTO ministerial meetings — developing nations standing up for their rights, resisting a trade model that prioritizes interests against sovereignty, labor and the environment.
Still, the media ramble about the violence of Seattle, by far the majority of it issued upon nonviolent Americans, and omit the larger story. Is it so disappointing that the only "outside agitators" were truth agitators during the ADB?
Media wrung hands over the "outside menace," when this menace, doing the job of journalism, has forced international monetary institutions, including the ADB, to talk differently about trade than just a year ago. Where did a bank acquire such a driving concern for poverty, anyway?
Ohana Foley
Complaints still pending against Carol Gabbard
I'm a concerned citizen and a mother of two daughters in the Hawai'i public school system. I am the person who filed the formal complaint against Carol Gabbard with the Campaign Spending Commission.
In a premature press conference that Gabbard held on April 30, she claimed a previous informal complaint had been dismissed. However, due to the serious nine-count formal complaint filed against her, the previous informal complaint is still pending. Carol Gabbard has not been cleared of campaign spending violations, as Mike Hinchey stated in his May 10 letter.
The formal complaint filed against Gabbard reflects on her actions. If Gabbard had a clean slate, there would be no allegations filed against her. The fact that she raised over $80,000 and spent over $60,000 on an election for a nonpaying position on the Board of Education raised a red flag.
Her inaccuracies and omissions in filing her standard campaign spending law requirements have nothing to do with who filed the complaint. She needs to stop blaming the gay community for her mistakes and start taking responsibility for her own actions. The issue is about Carol Gabbard telling the truth and doing the right thing.
Gabbard has until May 30 to respond.
Nancy Gillespie
Hawai'i Kai
Environmental group very active in planning
Diane Ackerson's April 17 letter again pushed a half-truth, that no environmental group participated in the Hanauma Bay Task Force.
Several members of the Friends of Hanauma Bay were not only active participants, but the president of the group was the co-moderator of the task force. The Friends participants, of which I was one, presented their insights on the critical needs for the bay, based on their hours of being at the bay and striving to protect the fragile system. This resulted in the outstanding plan for the buildings at the bay.
The Friends of Hanauma Bay supports the Hanauma Bay education program. Program volunteers who give tours of the bay and staff the education desk are group members. It also adopted the Hanauma Bay Nature Preserve under the city's Adopt a Park program, taking responsibility for quarterly cleanups (actually done almost daily by the volunteers) and other enhancements.
There was continuous input into the planning from one of the most active environmental groups on O'ahu. Enough said.
Roy J. Gritter
Teachers should be paid only what is necessary
How much should the state pay teachers and professors?
Superintendent Paul LeMahieu said the salaries paid to education officers (higher than salaries paid to similarly responsible positions in other state agencies) are an expression of the value the state attaches to education. This is a mistaken view.
How much should the state pay for any good or service that is properly the state's business? As much as necessary, but not a penny more. When state agencies pay more than the absolute minimum, either (1) the state must buy less of the good or service than it could otherwise, or (2) the state must reduce expenditures on other vital services, or (3) Hawai'i taxpayers, who shoulder the third-highest tax burden in the U.S. (measured by state and local expenditures per capita), must surrender more of their income.
How much must the state pay to attract competent teachers? This is an empirical question that the state-monopoly DOE system cannot accurately answer. A monopoly is like an experiment with one treatment and no controls, a retarded experimental design. States with numerous small school districts and counties that subsidize a parent's choice of school through vouchers can more accurately assess costs. A market is an on-going experiment in how to coordinate resources most efficiently to meet needs.
The NEA/AFSCME cartel that operates the state school system doesn't want to hear this. Unions, even public-sector unions, are private 501-c(5) corporations. Their assets are the property of their members, and their legal obligations are to members and agency fee payers. In no case does a union have a legal obligation to "the public."
So long as our Legislature serves the NEA/AFSCME cartel and not the public, the answer to the question: "How much should the state pay state employees?" will always be "More."
Malcolm Kirkpatrick
California utilities have major loophole
Yes, California does have a longstanding policy of placing a percentage of power, telephone and television cables underground every year. The loophole is, the policy doesn't state where this must take place.
You'll be driving out in the middle of nowhere and run across a construction crew placing cable through a cow pasture. It's much cheaper than tearing up a street or someone's back yard.
Mike Sowers
Palo Alto, Calif.
Putting a price on a woman is degrading
T. David Burns, in responding to my May 7 letter, entirely misses my point. He states that because I do not encourage young women to enter the nude-dancing industry, I am "degrading nude dancers."
Quite the contrary, any time a man puts a price on a woman's body, degradation occurs. "Degrade," as defined in Webster's New World Dictionary, means "to lower in value." We now consider buying human beings to work for us (slavery) one of the worst sins this country ever committed. Why do we then tell women we can buy them to "work" for us?
This is the true degradation, not my believing a woman is priceless.
Stephanie Darrow
Republicans have their political royality, too
Dan Inouye has long been regarded as the "king" of the state Democratic Party. Now Hawai'i has a queen, "Queen Lingle" of the Republican Party.
She rules her subjects with a iron fist, not only dictating what legislation they must pursue, but also deciding which candidates can run for which race.
All bow to Queen Lingle, the future queen of Hawai'i?
Terry Davis
Ex-Marines? Never
Over the years, I have seen your paper, on occasion, refer to veteran Marines as "ex-Marines." Please be advised, in the name of professionalism, that there is no such animal as an ex-Marine.
Joseph W. Stevens
Major, U.S. Marine Corps (ret.), Kailua
New Japanese movie belies WWII brutality
With the approach of "Pearl Harbor," it is interesting to take note of another newly released film commemorating this 60th anniversary of World War II. "Merdeka" ("Independence") is now being shown to audiences throughout Japan so that, according to its director, Yukio Fuji, the world may be presented with "a proper understanding of history."
The story tells of how "thousands" of liberty-loving Japanese troops remained behind in Indonesia to make things right for the native people rather than selfishly return to their homes in postwar Japan. And rather than portray the emperor's troops as the monsters that, in point of fact, they famously were, the film paints their heroes in the highest moral tones of humanity.
Indonesian officials were at once aghast over the movie's grotesque inaccuracies and blatant 1930s-style propaganda. One scene had an Indonesian woman bowing tearfully on the ground and kissing the boots of a Japanese soldier in gratitude. In truth, the troops of the period callously enslaved, raped and murdered tens of thousands of civilians throughout Indonesia, China, Korea, the Philippines and Southeast Asia. Their victims were tragically looked upon as little more than dogs.
Curiously, modern Japanese school texts continue in their defensive, non-apologetic tone for the cold-blooded carnage that was unleashed throughout Asia. It is also something of a statement of our own society that with the surfacing of such brutalities, from My Lai to the Sen. Kerrey murders, a rabid and healthy hunger among Americans ensues to unearth the facts.
The recent submarine disaster that castigated, then dishonorably ended, a naval officer's career left many in Japan outraged and calling for his head. The current film "Merdeka" could only do the Asian world (including Japan) a service by attempting to enumerate and identify the untold heads they lopped off into the pits that "the dogs" had been forced to dig for themselves.
W. Thos. Hall
Lanikai
