ARMY TRAINING

ALTERNATIVES CAN'T REPLACE MAKUA VALLEY

There is a saying in the military that the more you sweat in training, the less you bleed in war.

After reading the story of the federal court not allowing live fire exercises at Makua Valley to resume, I am very disappointed by the decision. Live-fire training is essential to keeping our soldiers safe.

The purpose of these ranges is to not only provide realistic training of the troops under fire but also to provide for basic training and certification of troops to their assigned weapons.

Malama Makua says that the Army has other training sites like Pohakuloa, National Training Center at Fort Irwin and Joint Readiness Training Center.

However this argument is flawed. First, Pohakuloa does not allow live-fire training to the scale necessary for the division because the environmental concerns that are greater there than at Makua.

Second, National Training Center and Joint Readiness Training Center is focused on advanced training and assumes that the basics are already mastered and it is not cost effective to send the division away from the state for training.

We need Makua, and we need it now.

BIOTECHNOLOGY

TARO PLANT CRITICAL, MUST BE ENGINEERED

Thank you to James Brewbaker for his Jan. 29 letter reassuring the public that biotechnology of plants will increase the yield at harvest time.

With all due respect to the Hawaiian community, the taro plant also must be engineered in the laboratory to address the current poi shortage. Poi was very important among the ancient Hawaiians. Nutritious and easily digested, poi was fed to the babies who were too feeble to ingest other foods.

We have a responsibility to continue this tradition to ensure that future generations reap the rewards of the taro plant.

MORAL CRISIS

SOCIAL ILLS NEED MORE THAN BAND-AID SOLUTION

Soaring housing costs and an increasing number of homeless have emphasized the reality of a housing crisis in our community. The assault on an 11-year-old girl in a public park and several crimes related to substance abuse are pointing toward a safety crisis. The cost of healthcare describes a health crisis and the problems in our public schools a crisis in education.

In each of these areas of concern, we witness efforts to put necessary Band-Aids on the symptoms (transitional housing, more police and laws, another health plan and another revision of academic standards), but not enough attention given to solving the root causes (greed, poor decision-making, more greed and more bad decisions).

Therefore, what we really have is an across-the-board moral crisis that needs our immediate attention. As a community and a nation, we need to determine the universal moral principles that should direct our future — i.e., respect, honesty, responsibility, justice and compassion.

Our moral environment is being controlled by the values of wealth, power and prestige. The natural result of this value system is greed and bad decision-making.

If we want to create solutions for the crisis in housing, safety, health and education, we need to address the moral crisis. Families, religion and education have the primary responsibility, but it will require broad community and governmental support. In fact, we all need to participate.

VETERAN

AKAKA UNDERSTANDS WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE

I am very disappointed by Congressman Ed Case's decision to run against Sen. Dan Akaka.

I acknowledge that Ed Case has the right to run, but he is showing no respect for a kupuna, a man who is not only beloved by the people of Hawai'i, but also has been instrumental, along with Sen. Inouye, in making sure that Hawai'i is one of the few states that receives more in tax benefits than citizens pay in taxes.

Dan Akaka is a veteran who understands foreign policy; a former teacher and principal who understands the value and needs of education; director of Hawai'i's Office of Economic Opportunity who understands poverty and the plight of the homeless; a family man with five children and married 57 years; a person who values his Hawaiian heritage; and a U.S. senator whose seniority is a major factor in being able to obtain resources for Hawai'i.

I fail to understand how Ed Case can say he will support the Akaka bill, but not Dan Akaka. That's like saying I really like American cars and then go out and buy a foreign model.

Ed Case has developed a record of moving from job to job. An employer — in this case, the citizens of Hawai'i — in reviewing his resume might well wonder why he keeps changing jobs so often. Not long ago, Ed Case indicated he would not run for governor because he wanted to remain in the House of Representatives. What changed his mind?

I hope Ed Case changes his mind. In making his decision, he might want to reflect upon the race that Sen. Akaka ran against Pat Saiki, or reflect upon the story of the tortoise and the hare.

STATE SURPLUS

WILL RIGHTFUL OWNERS GET MONEY RETURNED?

One day a man and a woman found a large sack of money on their porch. The money was clearly marked with the owner's name, address and phone number. They immediately tossed away the identifying information and, so they believed, any responsibility to the rightful owner. Then they proceeded to think of all the wonderful ways they could spend the money that wasn't theirs.

Today our state government finds itself in a similar position. It has a large surplus that isn't the state's and it knows whom it belongs to. I'm curious, will it return the money to its rightful owner?

CELL PHONES

RECKLESS-DRIVING FINE SHOULD BE DOUBLED

I am sure I am not the only one to consider how higher traffic fines might improve the driving conditions on our busy streets.

I cycle into work on Wai'alae Avenue several times a week and can expect a close call with a careless driver about once a month.

Recently, I was almost hit by a driver in an SUV making a right turn on red while dialing his cell phone. A 10 percent increase isn't enough! I would like to see the fines doubled for reckless driving while using a phone.

And perhaps the increased revenue could be used to fill potholes and create bike lanes.

KALAELOA

PRISON UNWANTED ON LEEWARD COAST

Here we go again, dumping the "unwanted" to the leeward side.

Yesterday the big story was a dump site at Ma'ili; today it is a prison in Kalaeloa. Why don't the people in charge look toward the other side of the island?

The second city of Kapolei is already crowded and starting to get dirty as it is. We do not want any more dumping of the unwanted.

What we want is a new and better road and access to and from Kapolei, and not more people before the infrastructure is built.

Instead of a prison, why not use Kalaeloa for education centers? We need more schools in the area, not prisons. Go east, my friend!

MAKAKILO VICTIM'S FAMILY FINDS NO SPEEDING CHANGE

The first month of the year is at an end and I feel that the motorists of Makakilo need a wake-up call. Why are so many still speeding?

We, the "Monday morning sign wavers," went on a little break over the holidays, as did the schools, school buses and students for most of that time.

I am sad to say that with our second week back out on Makakilo Drive, speeding is an even bigger problem now. It didn't take the motorists long in our absence for things to return to what I would call extremely dangerous driving habits.

On Jan. 23, at least 265 motorists were speeding, 189 of them traveling downhill and 76 uphill, between 6:30 and 7:45 a.m. Sadly, three of them were school buses traveling at 31 mph to 35 mph in the 25-mph school zone.

On Jan. 30, there were at least 331 motorists who were speeding, 219 downhill and 112 uphill, between 6:30 and 7:45 a.m.

We have had people tell us after the death of our son on April 4, 2005, that you can't speed uphill on Makakilo Drive, but I assure them, they can and they do.

We clocked a motorist on Jan. 30 flying uphill at 50 mph. That's twice the legal speed limit. Are you kidding me?

I want to remind our community members of their duty to obey the speed limit, in the school zone and out. You all need to slow down.

We appreciate those of you who have not forgotten and have continued to show your support with a wave of the hand and a smile, but I would like to urge the rest in the community to be more cautious.

We are all responsible for the safety of the children, pedestrians and motorists who use Makakilo Drive.

I would also like to see more support from the HPD, as its presence has been lacking since before the holidays. Whether this was because of our absence or because most schools were on break, I do not know, but police officers need to be out there now. The speeding is still out of control.

NOT TRUTH-SEEKING

DARWIN CAN'T EXPLAIN IT ALL

In his Jan. 28 letter, Robert Cowie stated that he's "astounded" that The Honolulu Advertiser would publish a letter from a reader who doesn't believe in the theory of evolution.

Mr. Cowie's presumption that certain viewpoints ought to be censored is very revealing. At the risk of being censored, I'd like to throw out a few facts for discussion.

Most mutations are harmful to any given organism, so the fossil record should be replete with transitional forms and many mutants that didn't survive, but it shows neither.

Darwin proposed that the fossil record should show a "tree of life," with a few simple forms at the beginning eventually branching out into more numerous complex forms.

What the fossil record does show, in fact, is the sudden appearance of nearly all the animal phyla during the Cambrian explosion about 600 million years ago, without any evolutionary ancestors as required by Darwinism, and a decline in number of species since then.

In addition, recent discoveries about the unbelievable complexity of living cells and biochemical systems cast further doubt on evolution.

"Irreducible Complexity" is a term coined by Dr. Michael Behe, Professor of Biochemistry at Lehigh University and Senior Fellow at the Discovery Institute. It describes levels of complexity that simply can't be arrived at by successive, slight modifications, because anything less than the complete functioning system would be harmful or fatal to the organism.

Living systems are replete with irreducibly complex features, like vision, blood-clotting, the immune system, bacterial flagella and many others that require a specificity and synchronicity that don't happen by chance.

Anybody who reads Behe's book "Darwin's Black Box; The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution" with an open mind will realize that macroevolution is impossible.

Most scientists incorrectly assume that evolution's details have been worked out by others. Unfortunately many scientists are steered by philosophy, not truth-seeking.

As Nobel laureate biologist George Wald observed, "Spontaneous generation was disproved 100 years ago, but that leads us to only one other conclusion, that of supernatural creation. We cannot accept that on philosophical grounds; therefore we choose to believe the impossible: that life arose spontaneously by chance."