The unfortunate reality is that the current and foreseeable future volume of interisland travel will not support two profitable competing airlines. The local carriers cannot continue to rely on government bailouts as Hawaiian Airlines received several years ago.

Certainly the merger will present problems, especially in the transitional phase. But to me the most encouraging aspect is the leadership of Greg Brenneman, whose turnaround of Continental Airlines was truly an outstanding accomplishment — and who, unlike many other CEOs who focus on the bottom line at the expense of the employees and the public, is demonstrating genuine concern for employee morale and passenger satisfaction.

I believe the merger will ultimately produce one efficient, financially sound local airline with a positive public image.

Bob Gilkey

Why isn't Watada investigating others?

I am increasingly suspicious of the true motives of Bob Watada, the executive director of the Campaign Spending Commission. His position is supposed to be nonpolitical, but I really don't believe that to be the case.

If this wasn't politically motivated, then why isn't he also investigating the Linda Lingle and Ben Cayetano campaigns? I have heard that these campaigns were allegedly not forthcoming with the names of their campaign contributors and that they also received more than the allowable amount from Geolabs.

Ellen Abrams

Arakawa judged guilty before trial started

"HPD disciplines dozen in Arakawa crash case," the headline read. The initial reaction was that Clyde Arakawa is guilty. HPD actions indicate it.

I felt this reaction and yet I am his relative who cares deeply. If I felt this way, then how did the jury and public feel before the case went to trial? How can Clyde have a fair trial? His past can be exposed but not the victim's. He had to hire his own attorney.

The HPD announces its actions, the largest in the department's history for one case, after jury selection. He was abandoned due to public uproar. I realize that discipline of the officers was due to procedures of the investigation and not from the accident itself, but it still leaves Clyde in a position of guilt.

I am not defending Clyde, because the family does not discuss the accident. We do not judge Clyde. It is not our place to do so, and we know him to be a good man. I only know that he has been put in a position of guilt before the trial started. Is the trial just going through the motions? Which police officer will be next?

Naomi Campbell
Kahului

Homeowners aren't entitled to refund

Drew Kosora in a Jan. 24 letter insists that the Hawai'i Hurricane Relief Fund (HHRF) money be used strictly for hurricane relief or given to those who own real property.

The state stepped forward to cover Hawai'i's people during the period private insurers weren't willing to do so. Homeowners paid into the HHRF, and if a hurricane have occurred, they would have been covered. No hurricane hit, and homeowners aren't entitled to an after-the-fact refund any more than they would be with their auto or other insurance.

Premiums paid by homeowners ($336 million) were insufficient to pay for the reinsurance the state had to purchase to cover them ($385 million) — and that shortfall ($49 million) had to be made up by surcharging insurance companies and levying fees on the transfer of real property, which is the source of the remaining balance of the fund.

Leaving $213 million sitting in a special account wouldn't make a dent in covering losses if something on the order of Kaua'i's $2 billion Hurricane 'Iniki hit the much more heavily populated island of O'ahu.

If the Legislature wants to maintain the HHRF to be put toward a future hurricane, however, that is acceptable. But to give the premium back to each homeowner is totally unjustified and would amount to all taxpayers subsidizing the cost of insurance coverage for people like Kosora.

Jackie Kido
Director of Communications
Office of the Governor

Traffic van editorial supports lawbreaking

In regard to the Jan. 27 editorial "Tickets bad enough without insurance hike": The logic in your editorial is pitifully sub-juvenile.

Why not apply your twisted logic to shoplifting, assault, robbery and rape and let the citizens have a little more leeway in violating laws? Driving in excess of the posted limit, no matter how slight, constitutes breaking the law.

But your last paragraph is the kicker: "This is a ticket issued against a car, not a person. It should not be used to build a case against an individual's driving record." Under your logic, the car determines which speed it will go in a given area, and the driver is helpless to control it.

Perhaps you also believe that the car, not the driver, should be held responsible for reckless driving, hit-and-run and getting onto the road without a licensed driver. Is it probable that your word processor should be held responsible for such a dim-witted editorial rather than have it affect your credibility?

If you had proposed raising the speed limits in certain areas, that would be a valid argument. To encourage violation of the law is quite another.

Roger D. Van Cleve

County should run camera program

I was happy to see the Jan. 27 Advertiser point out on the front page that I had voted against the traffic camera bill in 2000. I did vote for the bill in 1998; however, as I read it then, it seemed to put this program under county control, as are the police departments.

Most people do not realize that the police work for the county, and when they write a ticket, the money from the fine goes to the state, not the county. The police have an incentive to provide safety, but not a financial one. Seems to me that's the way it should be.

This is clearly a police function that has been put under the state Department of Transportation. This state-run automatic ticketing has been nothing more than racketeering.

Now imagine a state gambling commission.

Rep. Jim Rath
R-6th (North Kona, South Kohala)

Just because it's a law doesn't make it right

In response to Ralph Rubique's Jan. 23 letter, I would like to ask him: Have you ever jay-walked?

Just because there is a law — be it speed limits or jay-walking — that little fact doesn't make it an absolute. Laws are rewritten all the time: because the wording is technically wrong, because the law is unconstitutional, or because, as in the case of our absurdly low speed limits, the law is outdated.

I wonder if Mr. Rubique realizes that most speed limits are set arbitrarily, especially in Hawai'i, and not due to engineering or design concerns. I wonder if Mr. Rubique knows that the federal government and virtually every other state in the nation long ago abandoned the 55-mph speed limit. (I wonder if Marilyn Kali knows this as well.)

I also want to ask Mr. Rubique when he surrendered to totalitarianism? I want to ask him when did he discover that government is always right, and that he (or any other citizen) lost the ability to protest a bad law?

James Ko

Pauahi didn't donate to the public schools

I'm not an expert on Pauahi's will, but current accounts such as Thurston Twigg-Smith's indicate that interpretation of intent is significant.

If Thurston's interpretation that the Kamehameha Schools' admission was for all is truly the case, why didn't Pauahi just donate the major part of her estate to the public school system? Private schools, paid for by the students' families, were for those who could afford it. This was and is the norm. Do you think she was instituting a private school for all who could not afford it?

Let's stop the myth that kanaka maoli were not deprived of their assets and rights by the U.S.-supported oligarchy that ruled Hawai'i subsequent to the suppression of the Hawaiian Kingdom. Let's also stop the myth that we are indigenous Americans requiring special treatment within the plenary power of the United States.

Rather, let's act to clarify the myth of U.S. justice and hold America and Americans accountable to law.

Michael Locey
Anahola, Kaua'i

We can't take much more from the state

While making my way slowly out to Leeward Community College the other morning, I couldn't help but mull over the heaping of another injustice on our citizens:

• Not only is our economy in the doldrums (again), but people have lost and are still losing their jobs.

• Town-bound traffic coming in from the Leeward side, unbearable before the cameras, seems to be clogged up as late as 9:30.

• People are having their homes foreclosed on.

• Cars that weren't being maintained before because of the expense will double, even triple, if the state traffic camera fines take the money that would have been used for car repair (or even to put one more meal on the table).

• People have been taken off welfare as of December, just in time for Christmas.

• The homeless are increasing.

And we now have a proposal for only one local air carrier with the merger that should sock it to us after a two-year clause.

What else can they do to us? Raise taxes? I don't think we can take being squeezed or pushed around any more.

The people behind the cameras are lucky they are only getting obscene gestures. The governor is lucky that the last time he faced an angry crowd, it was just obscene gestures.

I forget, which character was it in Oz who needed a heart?

Cassandra Aoki

Pre-checked animals should be released

We moved here in July from Alabama (military move), and I started the lengthy process to avoid the 120-day quarantine for our two beloved dogs.

After numerous visits to the vet in order to have all the necessary tests, plus an extra visit for our English springer spaniel who came from England with us and had no rabies antibodies in her blood because they do not have rabies there either, we spent $2,000 to move them here with us. This does not include the $275 reimbursement the military gave us for one of our dogs.

I began all these tests in January, six months before we moved here, and I believe that in that six months, our vet would have been able to determine if either of our dogs had rabies. If you have documentation of all shot records and all vet visits a year before you move here, why can't that be proof enough that the animals are rabies-free? And if the state still requires the 90-day waiting period along with all the shot records, that should be enough for the animals to be released once they are checked at the airport.

Don't put more salt in the wound by making those animals stay in quarantine. If the owners are willing to do all the paperwork required in the time span required, then spend $2,000 to bring their pets to Hawai'i, do you really think they would bring one that has rabies? Think about it.

Kelly Y. Nobbs

Allegations against Harris are suspicious

Let me see if I have this right. People should be allowed to break all the speeding laws they want, endangering the lives of other people, as well as engage in countless other traffic offenses without being ticketed. But at the same time, Mayor Harris should be tarred and feathered and considered unfit to be governor, despite his obvious qualifications, because of allegations that he may be guilty of a misdemeanor.

A misdemeanor? Mayor Harris may be guilty of a misdemeanor, and we're not only getting the prosecutor's office but the FBI involved?

There's something wrong with this picture.

Bonita Newland
Kane'ohe

'Vagina Monologues' from male perspective

A band of women whom I socialize with, work with have planned to attend the "Vagina Monologues" for weeks now. We scored front-row tickets. We're leaving the men at home and have been sharing tidbits of information over the past few weeks.

We have an idea of what we're in for, but don't really know for certain. So I read the "Stage Review" printed in the Jan. 25 Island Life section with great interest.

And I'm bothered. I'm bothered that it was written by Joseph T. Rozmiarek. What did we lose in the translation by a male reviewer?

(Don't roll your eyes. This is a woman thing.)