Letters to the Editor

Here we go again with rusting infrastructure

As I was driving along H-3, Honolulu-bound (on the Kane'ohe side), the other day, I noticed something disturbing. On the elevated roadway Kane'ohe-bound, I saw that the metal "spacers" between the concrete supports of the roadway and the vertical concrete support pillars were apparently rusting.

This brought back memories of our Aloha Stadium and the "movable stands" that became fused by corrosion, and of the rotating La Ronde restaurant (on top of the Ala Moana Building, which is now being used as a real estate office) that also became fused in place by corrosion.

It seems to me that there is a "learning curve" on the effects of a corrosive atmosphere on ferrous metal that has yet to be achieved here in Honolulu. Hopefully, there is another reason for the red look of the spacers between the concrete supports of the roadway and the vertical concrete support pillars. If not, we will have a major repair bill when these spacers finally deteriorate in about 25 years.

Officers are trained to show discretion

Lana Miller's Nov. 4 letter, "Don't blame officer for enforcing the law," discusses an officer who was apparently tagging cars at a keiki carnival. Ms. Miller states that "The law is the law," and officers should not bend the rules.

I would like to inform Ms. Miller that officers are trained to show discretion at certain times. Although discretion does not mean bending rules, it does give an officer the choice to look at certain situations and determine on his or her own what the best course of action should be when handling non-emergency or non-hazardous situations. An officer must look at the big picture when deciding to enforce rules.

Aggravating the community by handing out unnecessary tickets at a community event is certainly a time when an officer who cares about his or her community could utilize some discretion. If the tagging took place because of other members of the community complaining about the parking, that's one thing. But if the officers tagged the cars simply because they were in violation, well, that's just mean-spirited. Remember, this is supposed to be the Aloha State.

Independent Hawai'i has many advantages

I read the Nov. 4 letter by A.W. Wooddell with interest because I have been thinking about Hawai'i's separation from the United States for years. The reasons Hawai'i became a state are to receive federal money, close cultural ties and shared language.

But as Mr. Wooddell points out, Hawai'i, in spite of close cultural ties, is still culturally and ethnically very different from the Mainland. And our remoteness geographically puts us at a disadvantage when we have to share some laws that may be in the best interest of the hundreds of millions of Mainlanders but are detrimental to Hawai'i.

An independent Hawai'i could follow some European models, with a constitutional monarchy having a parliament and a figurehead royal family. The only problem would be picking a royal family.

An independent Hawai'i could make treaties with the United States and allow the military to maintain facilities here, at least for now. An independent Hawai'i could make laws that allowed free trade with any country we wished without the restrictive Jones Act. An independent Hawai'i could continue to use U.S. currency or mint its own or use any currency from any country, or all of the above.

It is a mistake to assume that Hawai'i's congressional delegation has enough clout to get what is best for our geographically remote location and diverse cultures.

I thank Mr. Wooddell for bringing this subject to the Letters and Commentary pages; this does deserve serious discussion and perhaps a committee to start to work out details and then bring it to the public for vote.

Nails sticking up from roadways are a hazard

It's the law: We must ride our bikes and walk along the road shoulders; it is also common sense.

Now comes along a survey crew or some state crew that pounds huge nails into the pavement (in the middle of the shoulder) and leaves them sticking up about an inch, just enough to make someone trip over them, or to cause a bike tire to blow out if it hits one of them just right.

Of course, these nails aren't marked in any way. You can't pull them up; they are set in to stay. I have seen several of them in the middle of the shoulder along Kalaniana'ole Highway. There is one a few hundred feet downhill from the "scenic lookout" going toward Hawai'i Kai from Hanauma Bay. It is on the mauka side of the highway, right about where a good bike rider might hit 40 mph-plus.

It might be a good idea if the people who put these "land mines" into the street were made to make them safe, or take them out. Just think of the liability to the state, and the pain one might suffer having skin grafts.

Jan Stephenson is right about cultural conflict

I'd like to thank Jan Stephenson for pointing out cultural conflicts that may hurt golf. That Asians learn English in school but don't speak it is a problem I ran into long ago in Japan.

Relatives attending elite Tokyo and Kyoto universities said that English is for passing the college entrance exams, not for talking to foreigners. Language immersion lessons tailored for golf English should solve many of these problems.

Jan Stephenson is a winner for telling it like it is.

Lying versus laying

In the Nov. 4 paper, page A5, there was an error in the caption under the photo of Bethany Hamilton: " ... the tiger shark may have mistaken Bethany, laying on her surfboard, as a turtle."

Was she laying an egg? It should have said, "lying on her surfboard."

Parking enforcers deserve our praise

There are many noble, goodhearted people in our community who care so much about the safety of our community and the beauty of our 'aina that they would be willing to sacrifice their personal time and safety as volunteers by helping to rid our landscape of abandoned cars, illegal dumping and littering.

These people deserve our praise and thanks. The work of such volunteers is hard and sometimes dangerous, and they need and deserve all the support that those of us who are not so selfless can give them.

What they do not deserve is the backhanded condemnation by The Honolulu Advertiser in an Oct. 24 editorial comparing volunteers to vigilantes. It must certainly be hard for volunteers in the handicapped parking enforcement program to tolerate the snide and sometimes angry remarks of those who receive citations. But it must be even more difficult and painful for them to have to read The Advertiser's editorial headline, which calls volunteer policing "vigilantism."

So now such volunteers will not only have to put up with the punks and lawbreakers, but they will also have to deal with the condemnation by The Advertiser. You should be ashamed of yourself.

Serious disconnect with conservative viewpoints

In a recent letter, Jack Savage complained of a serious disconnect between the opinions of his colleagues and neighbors and those of this newspaper.

Actually, it seems there is a serious disconnect between his conservative viewpoints and reality. Consider the following counterpoints:

Stryker hearings: The Army has itself realized that arresting people for simply carrying protest signs at a public hearing is wrong. Further, the protesters have demonstrated that more time is needed to comment on the Army's environmental report for the planned Stryker brigade. Forty-five additional days have been added for the public to review and comment on the report.

The war on Iraq: It has little to do with protecting American civilians. We have yet to find any evidence that Saddam was poised to use weapons of mass destruction against us. Rather, there is plenty of evidence that failing to win the support of the United Nations for this war makes us an even more contemptible target.

Homosexuality: If it were unnatural, as Savage claims, this behavior would only take place in some kind of laboratory experiment. Increasingly, governments, major corporations, universities, individuals and families are recognizing that gays and lesbians merit the equal rights, protection of law and freedoms they have long been denied.

The ACLU: It is a protector of civil liberty without regard to religion. If Savage feels they are anti-Christian, perhaps it is because many of the leaders of Christendom are more concerned with maintaining their own power than in standing up for those who are oppressed.

Gov. Lingle: She is most certainly a Republican. Thankfully, this party that rules our nation is comprised of a diverse citizenry, some of whom really want to do the right thing for their country and community.

Taxes: While Hawai'i does have relatively high state tax withholding rates, we're hardly the highest. Rounding out the picture is the fact that Hawai'i receives far more federal dollars than we pay in national taxes.

Environmentalism: Wind-blown plastic bags are but one symbol of a society that chooses to consume far in excess of our needs. Republicans and conservatives have a long tradition of opposing renewable energy, recycling, land conservation and public transportation.

Ocean awareness should be taught in high school

In 1971-72, while attending San Clemente High School in Orange County, Calif., I participated in a pilot program, known at the time as "beach activities," during my senior year.

This program met the school requirements for physical education, but more importantly, it taught all of us what I would call "an ocean culture" or "ocean awareness." You had to have a "B" average to be eligible for the program; you had to have your parents sign off on providing insurance liability; and you had to pass qualifying tests in the swimming pool.

The curriculum involved learning, and subsequently passing, all lifeguard skill examinations, including running times, swim times, CPR and "what if" scenarios in the event of an emergency. The idea was to give the students skills for use at picnics, beach outings of their own, or as a springboard to becoming a city or state lifeguard.

With the above completed, we learned about the origins of surfing, played volleyball on the beach and, when the surf permitted, we competed with one another.

What I retained from this class was a complete view of our ocean environment. Following high school over 30 years ago, I moved to the North Shore and have been involved in many rescues around O'ahu, assisting our talented water safety experts or just being an extra set of eyes in and around the ocean.

I believe a class that would incorporate the above, along with Hawai'i's unique historical and cultural enrichments to the sea, is an essential part of educating Hawai'i's young. And if you train 30 sets of additional eyes with each class, including CPR, and teach them to be as wise as the person was in the most recent attack (to use a surf leash as a tourniquet in the very, very remote chance of an attack), you have made all of us safer.

Sharks are out there. They always will be. It is their sea that we splash around in. But being as we are there as well, doesn't it make sense to have our children properly trained and prepared with regard to the ways of the sea for the benefit of all of us in Hawai'i?