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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Thursday, February 6, 2003

Letters to the Editor

Pouring millions into stadium just a waste

Let's give one large cheer for Mayor Fasi. His statement a few years ago could not have more meaning than it has now. He said that we should tear down Aloha Stadium and sell the land for condos.

Frank, you were totally right. These aging jocks in the Legislature are going to blow it again.

We have lost control of logic and a sense of reality when our government here in Hawai'i will once again try to entice a professional sports team to these shores by flinging over $40 million into the outhouse called Aloha Stadium.

They just don't get it. They built it, and nobody has come. Sort of like the Convention Center.

Arnold Van Fossen


Hydrogen commentary full of factual errors

Brian Barbata's Feb. 2 commentary supporting the use of oil is full of factual errors and implicit assumptions that are largely unacceptable.

For example, he claims that "(hydrogen) has to be made (sic) and transported ... by means not even invented yet." Then in the next paragraph he explains that hydrogen can be "easily" extracted from natural gas. The latter is true, contradicting the former.

Mr. Barbata assumes that natural gas is "worse" than oil. That is not true. Natural gas is a much cleaner source of energy than oil. Japan imports liquefied natural gas, so why couldn't Hawai'i?

He also claims that extracting hydrogen from seawater is "unrealistic." Apparently, he totally discounts electrolysis done by smaller, safer nuclear plants as "unrealistic."

Mr. Barbata seems to be at odds with the scientific community, the environmental community and even President Bush. He makes much of the "costs" involved when the fact is, every ounce of oil burned externalizes costs on the whole world that the consumer will probably never pay for, but her children will.

Jon-Erik G. Storm


Opera for Everyone a smashing success

Once again Hawai'i Opera Theatre's Opera for Everyone program transformed giggly mouths and gangly arms and legs into ladies and gentlemen transfixed upon the magnificence of the opera "Eugene Onegin."

These students stayed riveted in their seats and gave a standing ovation as they cheered the heroine and jeered the villain. At no other night will you hear so much energy and enthusiasm at the opera.

All this is made possible through the Opera for Everyone Education Program of HOT, coordinated by Erik Haines and Stephanie Conching.

Nearly 1,000 students, mostly from public high schools, attended the event, representing over 20 schools and organizations and twice as many teachers. We are fortunate to have educators willing to go the extra mile to expand the horizons of our young people and open their eyes to a world they had never even thought about.

Students will also be seeing productions of Mozart's "Magic Flute" and Puccini's "La Boheme."

Bravo! to the teachers and HOT. Keep up the good work.

Norma B. Nichols


Don't blame defense for case dismissals

As a criminal defense attorney who appears regularly in courtrooms 7A and 7B of the Honolulu District Court, I found Patrick Maher's Jan. 28 letter ("Here's why police officers leave") to be filled with misrepresentations and misleading innuendos.

Like Maher, I urge the people of Hawai'i to attend these courts. Cases are not dismissed for denial of the right to speedy trial where the defendant is responsible for the delay. The law is crystal clear that delay attributable to the defendant is excluded from any speedy-trial calculation. Whenever there is a close question, inevitably Hawai'i's district judges come down on the side of the state, not the defense.

Maher is correct that cases are dismissed, sometimes even serious cases. However, these dismissals occur for two reasons:

  • The state's witnesses, usually police officers, failed to appear after being subpoenaed, and the prosecutor does not know why the witnesses have failed to appear.
  • The prosecutor has been incompetent and failed to properly prepare for trial. Needless to say, neither Honolulu Prosecutor Peter Carlisle nor the HPD wants the public to know these facts. It is so much easier to misrepresent to the public that these things happen because our judges are notoriously lenient or we shifty defense lawyers have subverted the system.

If the public wants a better justice system, it is time to ask Carlisle why his office loses so many cases.

Earle A. Partington
Criminal defense attorney


Competition to HMSA needed to contain costs

Mahalo to Gov. Lingle for proposing health insurance reform in Hawai'i.

Removing HMSA and Kaiser from the business of deciding which companies are allowed to sell insurance in Hawai'i is key to controlling insurance costs. The lack of competition is the heart of the matter.

I hope that she will get support from the Legislature. Not only are small-business rates going up substantially, my individual plan will have gone up 46 percent in four years.

The problem is the near-monopolistic position HMSA enjoys. I have a family member who is an employee of a Blue Cross affiliate in the Northwest. Up until several years ago, employment at the affiliate was exceptional: market salaries, extraordinary benefits, long vacations and a comfortable work schedule.

Now that affiliate has the same problems as HMSA and one additional: rate competition. As a result, they are conducting themselves in a business-like manner. They have reduced unnecessary staff and the costs of operation and entered into tough negotiation with medical service providers.

I see none of this happening at HMSA. It appears that when it can't make ends meet, it passes it on to the subscribers and continues business as usual. Why? No competition.

In the end, financial strength and premium rates are what it is about. HMSA's mission should be to provide the best insurance it can at an affordable price.

If it cannot provide affordable insurance, then it has to change its way of doing business. It is happening elsewhere. It can happen here if Hawai'i's citizens demand more competition. With competition comes cost control.

David H. Stewart
Kapa'a, Kaua'i


A-Plus provides skills, teamwork, discipline

Regarding Barbara Vincent's Feb. 1 letter: Ms. Vincent obviously is misinformed about our schools' A-Plus program and its functions.

On the contrary, this program is by far one of the great ideas in education.

Children involved in A-Plus are "off the streets" and are able to receive individual attention toward their school work. Every child in A-plus that I'm aware of is advanced in his study habits and excels in school because of A-plus.

These dedicated leaders teach proper social interaction skills and teamwork, and, above all, they give kids the discipline that might be lacking if this program is dropped for funding.

Please research the program before you thrash it.

Lorie Nagata


Vaccines do indeed work; end quarantine

Fred Belt's Jan. 28 letter shows he is ill-advised regarding pet quarantine.

Vaccines do work. Vaccines prevent smallpox, whooping cough, polio and rabies, just to name a few diseases.

This is 2003 — not 1912 or 1930 or 1940. Back in those days, before vaccines, people were quarantined. Belt should read up on all the scientific studies that prove vaccines work.

The state of Hawai'i agrees that rabies vaccines work. Lengthy quarantine is no longer needed except for pets that have not been vaccinated. The state has all the computer equipment necessary to verify that pets being brought into Hawai'i from the Mainland have had their rabies vaccinations, blood tests and ID chips installed before they arrive.

I've been through the system, and it's a horrible experience.

The land where the quarantine station is should be put to better use. The state veterinarian, Dr. James Foppoli, is asking for a budget of $3 million or more for operating in 2004. That money could be put to a much better use.

Valoy Alexander


Paramedics should be able to retire earlier

Paramedics are now lobbying to be able to retire with 25 years of service. When I was serving as a paramedic here a few years back, I clearly remember the same situation. Paramedics for the City and County were able to retire when they reached the age of 55. For some who joined the City and County of Honolulu EMS Division at ages 22 to 25, it would take years before they could retire, and for some that was too long.

I also remember that the opportunity for the EMS Division to merge with the Honolulu Fire Department existed, but there was so much opposition from the paramedics that it just ended up as a "back burner" situation.

I was always for the merger because it would benefit the paramedics — such as retiring with 25 years of service.

I am still in favor of city paramedics merging with the Fire Department. The Big Island Fire Department paramedics definitely retire with 25 years of service.

Ken Anama


More small tenants at Ala Moana will hurt

If the owner of Ala Moana Shopping Center, General Growth Properties, is going to put 30 more stores in the space created by J.C. Penney vacating Hawai'i, I wonder how some of the other tenants, who are bleeding red ink, feel.

I wouldn't be too happy with more competition, especially with Wal-Mart opening nearby in a year or so. They've had five stores (Royal Copenhagen, Z-Interiors, El Portal Luggage, Luscious Beauty and Calendar Club) close their doors in the last month — which doesn't include their AAA tenant, J.C. Penney.

Excluding Japanese shoppers, it's the anchors that draw the people to the mall with their one-day sales and other promotions. So with one less anchor and 30 more stores, the local retailers will be squeezed even harder.

In my estimation, Nordstrom would be a far better fit for Ala Moana.

Fred Cavaiuolo


It's the law, so start curbing overflights

If a law is passed in Washington, D.C., does anybody hear of it? Not if it falls into a forest on a tropical island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

Sure, the National Park Air Tour Management Act of 2000 flew through the U.S. Congress. And when it landed on President Clinton's desk, he instantly cleared it for takeoff. Then the administration changed, and the implementation of the new law was put into a holding pattern until it could be reviewed. But to every federal bureaucrat's apparent astonishment, President Bush approved the entire aviation law: tailhook, airline and rotor.

And what did our elected representatives decide that We the People wanted in our national parks? Peace and tranquility. And how do you achieve this? By limiting overflights to five per month per air-tour operator.

So why do some Big Island operators — in violation of direct orders from two presidents of the United States of America — send five times that many to strafe our homes on their way to blitz the park in a single day? Because nobody has told them not to.

Why doesn't Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park Superintendent Jim Martin put on his Smokey the Bear hat, hike down to the airport and start issuing citations?

John Carse
Kaimu, Big Island


President's excuses for war aren't credible

The Bush foreign policy is so bizarre that one wonders whether it is driven mainly by paranoia, greed and hunger for oil-based imperial power, by stupidity or by a combination of these.

The nearest the administration will come to a "smoking gun" in Iraq may be a small store of chemical or biological weapons. Anything more could not have escaped the inspections. It would be impossible for Iraq to use such weaponry in an unprovoked aggression against another nation without inviting total and immediate annihilation.

The only other plausible role of chemical and biological weapons is to spread the materials throughout the world for use by scattered terrorist teams — a tactic that also carries great risk for the perpetrators with little to gain.

We will never acquire perfect defenses against this kind of terrorism, and there is absolutely no respectable evidence that Saddam Hussein is lunatic enough to practice it.

In August 1964, Lyndon Johnson, never timid about lying to the American people, staged a completely fake attack by North Vietnam on U.S. destroyers. With two exceptions, the geniuses in the Senate swallowed it. Will Bush and Co., their make-believe diplomatic theater a worldwide flop, follow suit? And will we again be as dumb?

Will Butler


ACLU is hypocritical in attack on religions

I wonder why the ACLU is forcing its religion of atheism on us. It is the ultimate hypocrisy for the ACLU to attempt to ban all other religions other than its own while stating separation of church and state.

God is not a religion; the Calvary Church adheres to a "personal relationship with god," not a religious one.

Carolyn Crandall