SAVE UP TO 3 LIVES WITH EASY HOURLONG PROCESS

HOW CAN YOU BE A HERO, SAVE LIVES, AND THEN RECEIVE JUICE AND COOKIES?

It's easy — give blood.

Each year nearly 5 million Americans will need blood. Twenty five percent of us will need blood at least once in our lives.

Blood is used to help accident victims, cancer and surgery patients, burn and trauma patients, premature infants and more. A single blood donation may save up to three lives.

Donating is easy. A brief screening is done with a questionnaire, testing for blood pressure, temperature, hemoglobin, and pulse rate.

The screening and donating time takes less than an hour. The actual donation process only takes about 10 minutes. The blood is then tested for HIV/AIDS, hepatitis C, syphilis and other diseases.

Eligible donors are in good health, are at least 18 years old (17 with permission) and weigh at least 110 pounds.

President Obama has admirably sounded a call for public service. Giving blood is an easily accessible and rewarding public service.

For more information call the Blood Bank of Hawaii at 845-9966, or go to: www.bbh.org.

ECONOMY

WE CAN HELP BY BUYING AMERICAN AUTOMOBILES

Thank you so much for Michelle Singletary's wonderful column in the March 5 Advertiser ("This is for those folks who are griping, 'What about me?' ")!

What about me? The stimulus plan may not be the answer to all the country's economic woes, but at least those who support it are trying to do something — as opposed to nothing. Status quo is not working.

One of the most important things we all can do is to support American manufacturing. Perhaps the auto industry has not done its best to showcase "American know-how" — but the time has come and they know it — millions of jobs depend on it.

When I drive down the street, or through the shopping centers, and see so many more foreign cars than those produced by U.S. automakers, I am appalled. When I drive down the street and see a Ford, GM or Chrysler product, I want to blow the horn and give the driver a high-five.

I realize some of these foreign brands are produced in the U.S., but the profits are going to foreign corporations. Please, support U.S. manufacturing to help end this crisis.

HAWAIIAN MEMORIAL

PARK NEIGHBORS COULD WORK FOR COMPROMISE

Hawaiian Memorial Park suffered a setback in their efforts to develop land adjoining their cemetery in the meeting at Windward Community College on Friday. This setback may appease their neighbors but the news is not all good.

Hawaiian Memorial has been working for two years with the communities, each time improving and changing their plans. They offered concessions and agreed to record a covenant that would forbid any future development of residential housing on their property. This covenant would bind any future owners should the land be sold.

They offered to build flood controls for 50 years (10 years are required). I am not against developments but believe some developments on privately owned lands are inevitable and should be consistent with overall plans of development. A reasonable approach would be to balance the needs of the community for cemetery space against the desire for preservation of open space.

Neighbors need to realize a new owner may develop the area and not have to work as closely with the communities. DHHL could purchase the land and build a subdivision regardless of zoning, a developer could build an affordable housing project pursuant to HRS 201H and bypass the public hearing process.

An alternative is to work with Hawaiian Memorial toward a development that all parties can live with.

DOGFIGHTING

EFFORT A GOOD STEP, REVEALS CONTRADICTIONS

Hawai'i lawmakers are trying to control the clandestine world of dogfighting in this state by expanding the existing law to cover people who organize, facilitate, and attend the fights ("House to vote on dogfight measure," March 10).

We support this effort even though it is unlikely to do much good and even though the Hawai'i County police who will have to enforce it say they "have never heard of dogfighting" on their island (perhaps a new tax is needed to pay for police hearing aids?).

This legislation reflects the disgust many people rightly feel about dogfighting, but it also reveals some striking contradictions in human orientations to animal pain. For one thing, the 50 or so dogfights one of us watched on a Sunday in Japan several years ago were, on the whole, no more brutal than the human "ultimate fighting" competitions that have been staged in recent years (dogfighting in Kochi is legal).

A much bigger contradiction lies in our culture's capacity to treat a handful of domesticated animals — dogs and cats especially — with the consideration they deserve while at the same time remaining blissfully oblivious to the intense suffering of millions of cattle, pigs, and chickens who are treated like widgets from the day they are born until the day they are slaughtered for human consumption.

This institutionalized cruelty does everything it can to conceal animal suffering. When the ugly reality leaks out, as it occasionally does, the usual response is to look away and take another bite of the burger.