Letters to the Editor

Take a look at bus drivers' point of view

Regarding the Aug. 8 letter "Honolulu bus drivers shouldn't strike": I agree that our transit service and our drivers are among the best. I use the bus system every day for work, school and getting around, so I will be just as out of luck as everyone else if this strike happens.

But I think a lot of people are failing to realize that the drivers aren't striking for money alone. They are also fighting to keep benefits that they already have. Everyone tells the drivers to "think about whom you service" or "think about the public, or the students going to school, people going to work and their families." Have people stopped to think about the drivers' families? Or their jobs?

They're going to suffer just as we are. The company is spending all kinds of money on new buses, new high-tech computer systems and transit centers (in Kapolei). If you think about it, are they really needed? Don't we need our bus operators and maintenance workers more? I think so.

And as for the increase in fare prices, I think to keep all those extra cars off the road, paying more for bus service wouldn't hurt if it were an even increase across the board. But if they are cutting the services we need (and we already know they are), or the extra money made isn't going to the drivers, I'd rather find other means of transportation. Because why pay all that extra money if the buses are not going to be there when we need them?

Foreign vessels could sail directly to Hawai'i

The Aug. 11 article by Cliff Slater on the impact of the Jones Act on the citizens of Hawai'i was interesting. The facts of Hawai'i's shipping costs are a little different from what was stated in Slater's article.

The Jones Act is only applicable to goods transported between U.S. ports. Most of the goods that are shipped to Hawai'i originate in Asia. They are landed on the West Coast on foreign-registered vessels and then loaded on Matson to be shipped to Hawai'i as required by the Jones Act.

Foreign vessels, carrying goods from foreign ports, could sail directly to Hawai'i to unload if Hawai'i had port facilities for foreign vessels. The availability of port facilities for foreign vessels would allow for the citizens of Hawai'i to receive goods at far less cost than now available.

The availability of these facilities would require effort on the part of our Department of Transportation. Of course, this would also create additional competition to U.S. flag carriers now serving Hawai'i. I'm surprised that Mr. Slater, an admirer of market competition, did not include this in his analysis.

Could all of you who are so dedicated to "saving" traditional marriage please turn your attention to reality TV shows like "Who Wants to Marry My Dad?" ... a millionaire, a stranger for a million dollars? I find them immoral and disgusting, especially for children to watch.

Why are those commercial mockeries of marriage ignored while the Gabbards, and thousands of other misguided citizens, work so hard to deny civil equality to all committed adult relationships? A contestant on one of those shows can marry and become eligible for spousal benefits immediately.

My neighbors, who have been life partners for 20 years, must pay a premium for healthcare merely because they are of the same gender. Where's the simple fairness in that? Believe as you see fit, but please simply respect your fellow citizens who honestly and prayerfully hold a differing, even opposite, position. Who appointed you your brother's keeper?

Progressives were correct about interracial marriage. The world didn't end when those relationships were decriminalized. Are hapa people an abomination? Of course not.

Equality before the law and other civil rights are bestowed by our Creator and enshrined in our magnificent Constitution, not subject to a popularity vote.

And by the way, many, many scientists have observed same-sex relationships among numerous species in the wild, not to mention those mahu reef fish that change their sex, so save your breath about natural law. Perhaps your understanding of God and nature is as small as your compassion.

UH is pricing itself out of football market

Yes, I wholeheartedly agree with Joey Mitchell on filling the stands in Aloha Stadium to support our Warriors football team. However, the powers that be forget basic economics taught at UH, where demand for goods is dependent upon price.

If you over-price your item, there is less demand. This does not make sense if you want to support the team; we need more bodies and noise. Last year, Alabama had about 8,000 fans, but I swear the fan noise and support for its team seemed louder than the 35,000 Hawai'i fans for the Warriors.

Hope we learn from our past mistakes.

City Council is back to its disgusting old self

The old saying "the more things change, the more things stay the same" certainly applies to the City Council. We get six new members and a respectable chairman who tells it like it is, and we believe that finally we've got a council that will go about the city's business for the general good.

But it didn't take long for that dreaded word to resurface: reorganization. Now the council is back to bickering, power-grabbing and self-serving egos. Politicians never change. It's absolutely disgusting.

Photo touting meteor shower was a tad late

The Honolulu Advertiser's front-page photo and comment on Wednesday regarding "tonight's" Perseid meteor shower would have been much better suited for Tuesday's newspaper. Virtually all scientific journals, including thousands of astronomical Web sites, contain the simple information that the peak hours of the Perseid meteor shower were "just before dawn on Wednesday morning, August 13th."

In other words, one would want to stay up very late on Tuesday night, the 12th, or get up in the very early morning hours of Wednesday, the 13th. In fact, this is exactly what many of us who are truly interested in these phenomena were doing late Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning.

I guess the real joke is on your readers who waited patiently Wednesday night for something that already happened.

Insurance companies not acting in good faith

I'm confused because within two days, The Advertiser reported lower, then higher, car insurance premiums.

It seems you reported over the weekend that Hawai'i was among those states for which rates had been reduced the most. Yet on Tuesday, The Advertiser reported that rates will be raised by a majority of companies. Which is it?

The story reporting lower rates floored me and should not have been published. Insurance companies are known to steadily raise rates, so why report rate reductions?

We experienced a rate increase of 11 percent this year because of one incident that cost $1,100 to repair and did not involve any other parties. Our Jeep did not have the parking brake on and rolled into a large fleet van. The very small dent in the van's bumper was reported by my husband (who was not in the car). The insurance company, a well-known company with thousands of Hawai'i accounts, has now cited him as an unsafe driver and assigned points to our policy.

We pay $1,400 already on two cars per year, but the company felt that since it had to pay out $1,100, it would charge us $840 in premium increases over three years. The insurance company will get over $5,400 from us over three years. If we don't report another incident (for which we are purportedly covered), we'll not have to pay any more than that. Whew, what a relief.

It is evident how much margin the insurance companies make on good drivers and overall. So please don't bother reporting that insurance companies act in good customer faith and adjust their rates when we all know they will most likely just keep dinging most of us with increases.

Include all the cultures when marketing Hawai'i

I believe the governor's recently expressed concern about breaking up the HVCB budget unknowingly pointed to the source of Hawai'i's long-running economic doldrums.

She said that "We worked for a hundred years to create the image of Hawai'i that we want. How do you maintain that ... image?"

I assume the royal "we" refers to an old guard in Hawai'i whose annual blue-ribbon panels seem only to copy their predecessor's report, because it does not include me.

I believe the image of a happy fantasy island, filled with simple island natives whose young love to dance for tourists in revealing costumes, steals from Hawai'i's children the chance to be taken as seriously as others are when they compete in a worldwide economy.

But my key point is that the tourists, who are no longer coming as they once did, obviously agree with me. The 100-year-old image "we" like is not the one they buy anymore. It's that simple. Change what does not work or be left behind.

Governor, you said you wanted change, and this is a great place to begin a debate.

Let some new minds experiment with a new image based on all the impressive cultures from which the children of this island descend. Let's showcase the magnificent contributions by the cultures of all our children's ancestors to dance, architecture, science, art, music, philosophy, cuisine and religion, to name a few. All of these are more fascinating to the sophisticated 21st-century tourist than HVCB's made-up image.

The cooperative and courteous behavior called aloha will remain, because its source here is the same as its source where I grew up. An immigrant population so powerless and taken advantage of that its members had no choice but to learn to live peacefully with one another in Hawai'i, unified as "locals," from which no one is excluded.

Separatists seeking privilege and wealth at the expense of neighbors they wish to exclude are a more likely threat to Hawai'i's aloha spirit.

Tent for VIPs marred Thunderbird viewing

All except for the air show itself. Here we were with maybe 40,000 to 50,000 other people wanting to see the fabulous Thunderbirds. And directly between their parked aircraft and the public were three very large tents with roped-off areas for VIPs.

How is it that the best seats in the house and best viewing were taken by these VIPs? The tents and chairs were almost empty, while the rest of us stood behind and could not see what went on in the pre-show and the takeoffs and landings. The low-level flying was directly in front of the tents, which blocked everyone's view. Who were the VIPs and how did they get an invitation?

Finally, when the Thunderbirds arrived back on the ground, the post-show began directly in front of this area. When the pilots and crew members completed their post-show, they entered the tent area and mingled with the VIPs, while all the keiki, their parents and admirers stood behind the roped-off areas.

This action on the part of whoever decided to set up the VIP area was poorly planned; the area was several hundred feet wide, blocking most of the view for thousands of fans.

Why couldn't the VIPs sit in the sun like everyone else, so that the large tents didn't block our view?