Letters to the Editor
Bad guys are winning at Aloha Stadium
Jerry Burris' Oct. 7 column noted how Hawai'i residents reacted angrily to a Mainland newspaper writer's criticism of a perceived absence of patriotism here. Burris said the anger may stem from a sense among Islanders that we're not taken seriously by our fellow citizens on the Mainland.
Considering the decisions some local officials are making to administer security in public places, perhaps we've gone overboard in showing the nation we mean business. One example is Aloha Stadium, where authorities have banned purses, diaper bags and umbrellas.
A crisis requires those in authority to carefully analyze the situation and then apply a reasoned response based on the facts at hand. From the spectrum of enforcement possibilities, only those measures that accomplish the mission without unnecessarily imposing hardship on the public should be adopted.
Aloha Stadium authorities have come down so hard and so quickly that harsher measures based on new information would seem to be limited. Some are asking what's next — strip searches?
When all Americans are treated like potential terrorists, the bad guys win.
At this early stage of the game, the score at Aloha Stadium is Terrorists 1, Public 0.
Doug Carlson
Stadium's security results from paranoia
How are we to get back to "normal" activities if everyone is acting paranoid?
The latest fiasco is the stadium security. I couldn't keep from laughing about the posted sign. No weapons? Since when are people bringing in weapons anyhow to a football game? This is not the 1800s when people wore their guns wherever they went. The last time I checked, our overzealous legislators also banned carrying weapons. Folks, this is not Arizona.
For goodness sakes, let's bring some sense back into this tragedy. If terrorists really wanted to blow up that rusted structure we call a stadium, they would use products carried on their bodies in parts I do not think you are looking into. They will not be bringing in their AK-47s.
All of these idiotic restrictions only play into the terrorists' game plan.
If any of you out there are afraid to go to Aloha Stadium, then please stay home and lock your doors and windows, 'cause the rest of us football fans want to bring our backpacks, ponchos and purses to the games.
"General" Keiter, please reconsider this decision and review your signs before printing.
Suzanne Dykeman
Airlines are hiding mistakes in layoffs
Just days after the terrorist attacks on our country, airline executives announced they were cutting jobs of over 16,500 flight attendants.
In the days after the tragedy, when the airports reopened, passengers were stranded across the United States and overseas. They had to get home and someone had to be there on those flights to get them home. Flight attendants were there when the country needed to get back to normal. But now, even as the airlines are receiving taxpayer money to keep operating, our jobs are being senselessly cut.
The disaster has become management's umbrella to hide its many operational mistakes over the past few years. The result is that flight attendants were barely given time to grieve the loss of our flying partners before we were dealt the second devastating blow of losing jobs and our financial security.
We should all be standing together at this time — Congress and the American people, corporations and the American worker. At the rally at O'Hare Airport on Sept. 27, President Bush said to airline employees: "Everyone who showed up for work sent a message that we will not let terrorism cripple the United States." Now he is allowing U.S. airlines to cripple the lives of almost 100,000 American working families in the airline industry.
While the industry recovers, some temporary cuts may be necessary. But since the airline CEOs got their bailout with taxpayer money, it should be used to keep many of the heroes of the attacks working and secure. Instead, management is making draconian cuts.
Congress must act. Its must tell the airline executives to stop the senseless cuts or they will stop receiving taxpayer aid.
Steven M. Kelly
Where's objectivity in Afghan coverage?
The recent front-page color photo of a U.S. C-17 cargo plane and another graphic and prominent articles on page A5 give the impression that the air raids over Afghanistan were largely humanitarian.
Where is the mention that the United States used at least 75 warplanes (plus 50 more cruise missiles) in the first night of bombing alone, while only two (yes, two) C-17 flights were flown? And, unlike the European press, which reported comments from U.N. relief agencies and Doctors Without Borders largely criticizing such air drops as mostly "propaganda" or pitifully inadequate and expensive, your paper was rather silent on the efficacy of such "humanitarian aid."
Is this the usual standard for "objective news" from your paper? I would hate to think that this selective coverage of "America Strikes Back" might qualify as war propaganda.
Danny Li
Who says Hawai'i isn't at risk right now?
It is, of course, a laudable undertaking by our wise state leaders to embark on that arduous trip to Japan to drum up business for our badly ailing tourist industry.
Bravo for the initiative.
But I wonder if the message — "Come to Hawaii because Hawai'i is safe" — is correct. Where did they get that precious piece of information? Do they have a direct line to Osama bin Laden's headquarters, or to whoever else is attacking us? If so, perhaps they can then inquire when and where the next attack is scheduled and then can sound a warning in that part of the country.
Hawai'i is just as beautiful as ever, and visitors may even get better service now, but is it really safe?
Gerhard C. Hamm
Charity should begin at home with food rations
Since the Afghans do not trust the Americans and are reportedly burning the food rations we are dropping off to them, why don't we drop those rations off to our children in the United States who go most days with only one or two meals? I invite American children to contribute $1 to their local charities and or local food banks.
I just don't get it: Afghan children, looking up in the sky, asking "Is it a bomb? Is it food? Is it over yet?"
Keep the dollars here for our own children, drop off rations in the war-torn African countries and other needy nations where it will be welcomed and appreciated and eaten.
Linda West
Civil liberties at risk in current climate
After the attack on America, the Bush administration had sought extensive changes in the laws relating to wire tapping, surveillance cameras, searches, immigration and detentions. What is disturbing is the way the administration hoped to enact changes to the laws quickly with little regard for civil liberties.
As a result of the despicable terrorist act, a bipartisan Congress was almost unanimous in supporting our president's immediate response effort. However, much of this effort could have profound impact on much of our civil and human rights if we allow such reactionary, piecemeal legislation to be enacted without the necessary due process or forethought.
The American dream of many immigrants to our country may be shattered if legislation to allow indefinite detention of suspicious-looking immigrants because of their color, looks or origins is enacted.
Here in Hawai'i, many of us remember full well when World War II martial law was imposed. Also, many of our outstanding citizens of Japanese ancestry were shipped away to detention centers on the Mainland, while others suffered tremendous economic losses. The civil liberties that many of our citizens were accustomed to were denied during martial law.
The Democratic Party of Hawai'i is in full accord with the Bush administration and with the bipartisan efforts of Congress to enact far-reaching legislation to ensure that terrorism in America will not be tolerated and that the public's safety is perpetuated through careful and deliberate processes. In this regard, Hawai'i's Democrats are scheduling a human rights caucus at Abercrombie headquarters, 1517 Kapi'olani Blvd., starting at 9:30 a.m., Oct. 20, to ensure that these rights are protected and preserved in our beautiful Aloha State.
Walter Tonai
Waialua
'No negotiations' is adolescent response
Surely one of the low points in American history is Sunday's haunting TV shot of our president, so full of himself, responding to the Taliban with, "When I say, "No negotiations ... ," etc.
"I," Mr. President? When did we give this "war" to you for your own toy? Can it possibly be that you love playing commander in chief and the idea of being a real "wartime president"? On TV you reminded me of a too-pampered know-nothing adolescent, making your I've-got-more-tin-soldiers-than-you-have response.
And, "no negotiating"? In the name of all the citizens of this world, Mr. Bush, please just try that shoe on the other foot. If they came to us as you come to them, you'd expect us to fight to the death rather than to bend to such bullying. Your "president with an attitude" response seems clueless to the need to move beyond killing terrorists; shouldn't we expend every energy, every noble human quality, every effort to listen and understand and, up to our last dollar, to find real solutions that bring the whole world on board?
Please, please stop abetting a headlong rush into a worldwide holy war that can only usher in a Third Millennium Dark Ages.
Gaius Thede
Don't criticize plan to help out Waikiki
Regarding the story about businesses that are giving $100 bonuses to each of their employees to use in Waikiki to help the businesses there: Being a manager of a retail store in Waikiki's International Marketplace, I've seen and experienced firsthand the devastation caused by the losses to our tourism industry. I was very touched by the efforts being made by the business executives in Hawai'i to help other businesses.
That is why I was very disappointed to read J.Y. Matsuo's Oct. 11 letter criticizing the $100 bonus plan. Right now, we should be applauding efforts like the one made by Hawai'i businesses. Matsuo should not be looking for handouts and bailouts from state government. This person needs to understand that government cannot do everything for everyone, especially during this crisis.
We all need to pull together if we are going to see our way through it. Maybe Matsuo should visit Waikiki to see how bad it is before being critical of businesses trying to support Hawai'i's businesses.
Wayne Marques
Land reclassification doesn't make sense
Why are some doctors urging the reclassification of prime agricultural land to urban use? Doctors at Wahiawa Hospital have testified that a new facility is urgently needed. They want to build on Castle & Cooke's Koa Ridge project, which is now before the Land Use Commission.
It will be years, if ever, before all the approvals are in place to allow building. Castle & Cooke now has 104 acres already zoned "public facilities" in Mililani Mauka on which building could presumably start much sooner. However, the city Planning Commission recently approved Castle & Cooke's request to rezone this public facilities land to residential. This "Phase III" would hold about 800 homes.
Land zoned public facilities is not easy to come by. Right now, Castle & Cooke's Koa Ridge project envisions rezoning over 1,250 acres of prime agricultural land to build houses and has designated 210 of those acres public facilities, a portion of which would go to Wahiawa Hospital — 1,250 acres of prime agricultural land for 210 acres of public facilities land, much of which may not ultimately go to public facilities.
Are we willing to simply let go of 100 public facilities acres in view of the price we must pay in open space for such land? It will be up to the City Council to decide.
Pearl Johnson
President, League of Women Voters of Honolulu
No to more health insurance regulation
Your Oct. 10 editorial "Don't rush health insurance review" was very sensible and its spirit of being extra cautious on implementing more and more government regulation agrees totally with Libertarian efforts to make society better by making government as small as possible.
What government should be doing instead of hiring more regulators is to get more competitors for HMSA, Kaiser Permanente, et al. Send a "mission" to the big health insurers and HMOs on the Mainland and impress upon them that Hawai'i would be a good market for them by informing them that many, many big corporations have opened branches — Home Depot, WalMart, temporary employment agencies, etc. — in Hawai'i. They have discovered that business is great here.
When it comes to health insurance, Hawai'i is a great market because Hawai'i law, with its mandatory health insurance coverage for employees, guarantees a never-ending pool of customers.
Competition will solve a lot of problems all by itself. Government's duty is to do all that it takes to make sure competition thrives. The old, nonsensical solution of more regulation is idiotic and demonstrates the sophomoric thinking or power-grabbing of our elected officials, both of which must come to an end.
When will our elected officials ever learn?
When will our voters ever learn?
If the people will lead, their leaders will follow.
Alan T. Matsuda
