Port's defense of Sen. Kanno puzzling

I am puzzled by the commentary offered by Richard Port in the April 15 Island Voices. He defends Sen. Brian Kanno's intrusion into the Leon Rouse affair and touts the existence of the Amber Alerts as a prime example of citizen interaction with legislators to push new and necessary legislation. Yet he does not remind us that the Amber Alert systems protect the community against convicted sexual predators. Rouse was convicted of child abuse in the Philippines in 1998 for having sex with a teenage boy and spent several years in prison.

Port also interjects the issue of pet ownership in condominiums, a very puzzling non sequitur that has absolutely nothing to do with the Kanno/Rouse matter, although to his estimation, it casts him in a somewhat heroic role.

Port neither mentions nor castigates legislators Carol Fukunaga and Rita Cabanilla for introducing the hotel tax resolution designed to punish the cruise line for Rouse's firing. How puzzling.

Why is it that Port does not take the lead in guiding Rouse through the court system for redress of grievances, as is the common path for other citizens, since he is quick to cite a litany of "would've, could've, should've" arguments, implying that he is privy to a great deal of exculpatory information pivotal in Rouse's defense, doubtlessly compelling in the courtroom. Should this information be introduced and explored?

Drinking crackdown at UH is long overdue

As a UH alumnus and UH parent, I know firsthand that underage drinking on the Manoa campus has been a big problem for decades. However, this does not make it OK.

Students should not be surprised that measures are being implemented to curb this problem. It is about time. The health, safety and welfare of our students, as well as our community, are at stake. I commend UH and its task force for a step in the right direction.

Tax increase looks better put in context

I was enlightened at the last Senate hearing regarding the excise tax increase to fund mass transportation. Notably, The Advertiser failed to report that the anti-rail faction proposes a reversible toll road that during peak traffic could cost up to $10 each way to use. It's so simple to persuade people to be against a tax, especially when they remain uninformed.

What adds to the hilar-ity/tragedy is the ongoing whining about gas prices. They have doubled in the last 10 years, and could potentially double in the next 10. Add to that the possibility of commute times doubling.

The people of Hawai'i are being led to believe that rail is bad by equating rail with a tax. Oh, but wait until you see their proposal. Does the public have any idea whatsoever as to what is being proposed in the stead of rail?

Even though I've lived here 15 years, I'll have a place to run to when it's unbearable here. The locals, unfortunately, won't.

Flaw in bounty idea

In her April 17 letter, Kathleen Campbell suggests a bounty on coqui frogs.

While it is important to consider all options, and the positive part of this suggestion is that it gets the public involved, the problem with this approach is that it can encourage the importation and breeding of the frogs.

Congress is appalling

I am appalled at the efforts being made by Congress at destroying everything that we are supposed to represent to the rest of the world in the name of democracy. It is a prime example of "do as I say, not as I do." Leave our court system alone and instead work on cleaning your own house, i.e. Tom DeLay.

State workers' pay is a standard expense

I am a longtime state worker. Why are the politicians once again blaming us for all the budget cuts and tax increases they will have to implement to pay us?

They do this time after time and still haven't learned what every other citizen knows — a recurring expense must be budgeted for. They all know that the worker must be paid; they all know that the pay must be negotiated periodically; they all know that they didn't include a budget line for these expenses.

Are they all incompetent? Hard to believe. Is there an agenda involved? Likely. How do the governor and all the rest of them work side by side with us every day, expecting us to give our best, and all the while disrespecting our worth and our brains?

Production of meat is a great polluter

The 35th anniversary of Earth Day today should spur each of us to ensure that our irreplaceable natural environment will survive another 35 years. Indeed, it's the perfect day to cut the environmental impacts of our shopping, our driving, our diet.

Yes, our diet. Production of meat and other animal products dumps more pollution into our waterways than all other human activities combined. It's the animal manure and the runoff from animal feed crops, which carry soil particles, salts, pesticides, fertilizers and organic matter.

Meat production has been degrading our forests to pastures, feed cropland, then arid wasteland. It is the greatest threat to wildlife habitats and preservation of endangered species. The grains and soybeans we feed to animals could sustain the 840 million starving people in the Third World.

Today, let's celebrate Earth Day in the most fitting way — by replacing meat and other animal products in our diet with a rich, tasty variety of vegetables, fresh fruits and whole grains.

Stop griping about pay

I'm sick and tired of these people complaining that they are underpaid. They knew what pay was when they started. If they want higher pay, find another job. Stop grumbling.

What I don't hear is what they would do for the higher pay.

Critics of Akaka bill have nothing to fear

Mike Rethman, on April 17, writes, "but carving out (Hawaiian) benefits for some at the expense of others is always risky. And it's likely that it will make many in our multicultural, multiracial state less cordial, less respectful, indeed, less happy than now." His logic escapes me.

What is Mr. Rethman and those opposed to bettering the lifestyle of the indigenous people of Hawai'i, the very people who so innocently shared their aloha to foreigners, only to have them steal their rights and property, saying?

I recall the evictions of local poor from the Halawa area to build Aloha Stadium. These people were relocated to 'Ewa Beach in housing they were unable to sell because no one wanted to live in 'Ewa Beach. This anger was passed on to their children and their children's children. Remember Kalama Valley?

Our prisons are filled with "local" men and women. Many are illiterate, many were homeless until incarcerated, many are unskilled, and most are frustrated with a society that only protects the well-to-do. They live on beaches, only to be forced out. Outsiders bring illegal drugs into the state, making addicts out of entire families. Children go unschooled and are, therefore, uneducated.

This is something we should all fear and be appalled at.

The only ones who will be "less cordial, less respectful, indeed, less happy than now" will be the people like Mr. Rethman, who are running scared of the unknown. The Hawaiians never lost their aloha for others, even when they were stabbed in the back.

The fear expressed in the letters to this paper regarding the passage of the Akaka bill only reinforces my belief that the bill must be a good thing for those it will serve; otherwise, all these "multiracial" people would not be trying so hard to see it fail.

New African holocaust brewing

Max Boot, of the Council on Foreign Relations, chastises those of us in the West, and rightly so, for our indifference toward the ongoing tragedy in the western Sudanese region of Darfur ("Where's the outrage over Darfur crimes?," April 16). Having first written about Darfur in the summer of 2003, and having recently returned from another month-long visit to the Horn of Africa, I feel an urgent need to bring to your readers' attention another potential holocaust, the growing threat of another war between Ethiopia and Eritrea.

I say "another war" between the two countries because just five years ago, Ethiopia, a country of some 70 million, invaded its former colony, Eritrea, population 3.5 million. The Ethiopian invasion, which lasted just six weeks, resulted in at least 150,000 dead and forced 1.4 million Eritreans to flee for their lives.

Upon cessation of hostilities, a peace treaty was signed between the two countries in December of 2000 in Algiers. The Algiers Peace Agreement was comprehensive and "final and binding" and included a border demarcation, the reason given by the Ethiopians for declaring war against Eritrea in the first place.

The United States, United Nations, European Union and the OAU (presently named the African Union) all guaranteed the Algiers agreement, promising to enforce strict penalties, including sanctions, against either party found to be in violation. The U.N. Border Demarcation Commission released its "final and binding" decision in April of 2002 only to have the Ethiopian regime refuse to accept it. To this day, none of the international powers that promised to guarantee the enforcement of the Algiers agreement has carried out its duty to international law and invoked the enforcement provisions of the agreement.

Instead of the sanctions called for against the violator, Ethiopia, the United States and the European Union have actually increased their cash contributions to Ethiopia, the largest recipient of foreign aid in sub-Saharan Africa. Instead of using this aid to feed the many millions of Ethiopians suffering from drought and famine, the Ethiopian regime has continued its arms-buying spree and is now threatening another war against Eritrea.

The Algiers Peace Agreement was supposed to prevent this from happening again. If international law and the promises and guarantees of the United States, United Nations, European Union and African Union are so easily forgotten or ignored in the case of Ethiopia, why should the people of Sudan and its neighbors, especially Eritrea, expect anything different when it comes to Darfur?

As far as the Horn of Africa is concerned, it seems only war is "final and binding."