By Lee Cataluna
Advertiser Columnist

How far is Iraq from Hawai'i?

By some indicators, it might as well be a distant star, a small light that we watch fall from the night sky, believing with all confidence that it won't hit us, it won't land here.

Far enough so that the first thought on many people's minds was to run to Costco for toilet paper.

Far enough so that the main concern of the Legislature's House Select Committee on War Preparedness is sending folks to Japan to beg tourists to keep coming.

Far enough so that when the word "emergency" has been used by official sources, it is immediately followed by the word "funding."

Of course, the distance is only in our minds, in our inability to grasp how close all of this really is.

Bombs are falling, lives are on the line, there is worldwide disagreement on the morality of America's aggression in Iraq, and we're worried about gas prices and toilet paper and tourists.

Given the scope of what is happening, perhaps that's the best we can do. The most we can handle. Perhaps denial is the best coping skill we know. Denial or distraction.

It's hard to look at the grainy images of tank fire in the desert, the maps of cities with unfamiliar names, the low-light "Blair Witch" footage of reporters in combat gear, and comprehend that as reality. It's much easier to tune into fake conflict, like "Survivor."

Even some of the media coverage has quickly taken a turn into "War-Lite," as if we're three days into this thing and sick of it already.

Day 1, at prime time, one network ran a story about "How the war is going to affect the Oscars," with a companion piece on "How wars have affected the Academy Awards shows in the past."

Day 2, a radio station is playing a song parody, this one to J. Lo's "Jenny From the Block." Instead of Puff Daddy or Trick Daddy or Mac Daddy, it's "BaghDaddy" singing:

Don't be fooled by the bombs that I got.
I'm still,
I'm still
Saddam from Iraq

Missiles are going off and we're singing about it. That's pretty close to the definition of insanity.

It might be too much to ask of a coddled and comfortable nation to take the blinders off and to look unblinkingly into what is happening this very minute in Iraq. Look once a day. Look every two hours. Work up to asking a hard question or two in between doses of "reality" television, March Madness and the Academy Awards.

How close is Iraq to Hawai'i? Let's pray we don't have to find out the hard way. Not that we need to be scared, but we shouldn't be numb, either. Maybe we won't feel the pain way, way out here, but they'll feel it way, way over there, and that should matter. To all of us, that should matter.

Lee Cataluna's column runs Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Reach her at 535-8172 or lcataluna@honoluluadvertiser.com.