Worst Purchase; Can’t Buy Out Neil

A bit of dis and dots: Worst purchase I ever made (and that’s saying something): The UH football pay-per-view package this season. It was like paying someone to come to your house every weekend to smack you in the head ...

Not sure which direction the powers that be in Manoa want to go after the boughtout “retirement” of Coach Greg McMackin, or what their criteria may be for finding a replacement, but to me as a former sports writer who has known him for years, assistant coach Rich Miano has everything you want in a head coach, with both substance and pizzazz unless they’re looking for previous head coaching experience ...

And hopefully the salary will be something we can afford, and leave some cash for academics. Interesting research by Duke University, reported in the Dec. 12 issue of Time, found that while university professors’ salaries increased 32 percent since 1985 (at 44 schools studied), football coaches’ pay went up 750 percent. I love college football, but that’s just not right ...

Heard from a reader who wondered if we could offer Gov. Abercrombie a buyout similar to Coach Mac’s. Sorry, only voters can remove him from the big office at the diamond head end of the Capitol’s fifth floor, in 2014 ...

For Hawaii fans looking for another team to cheer this bowl season: Several local boys had big roles in the success of my other school, the U of Oregon Ducks make that the Rose Bowl-bound Ducks. Wade Keliikipi of Waianae was part of the starting rotation at defensive tackle, and he’s just a sophomore. Freshman Koa Ka’i from Kamehameha turned heads, also at defensive tackle. The Ducks’ Pac-12 champion squad also includes sophomore offensive lineman Mana Greig of Kailua/Saint Louis, redshirt freshman linebacker Isaac Ava of Ewa Beach/Saint Louis, freshman defensive back Bronson Yim of St. Louis, and sophomore linebacker Keloni Kamalani of Kamehameha-Maui ...

And I’m hearing great things about former Saint Louis quarterback Marcus Mariota’s progress. The freshman hasn’t played this season while “red-shirting” and playing on the practice squad, but my source says coaches are impressed with his smarts, character, speed and arm strength. . ...

OK, enough sports ... Fascinating read: Patrick Buchanan’s column in this issue about a new book based on writing by former President Herbert Hoover, asserting the U.S. did everything it could to provoke a Japanese attack everything but pull the trigger first. What’s amazing is that after so much has been written about Dec. 7, 1941, as well as its lead-up and aftermath, so much continues to come out that is new ...

And kudos to Bob Jones, whose reporting in MidWeek spurred the state attorney general’s office to last Thursday declare a cease and desist order to those guys giving out certificates inside Diamond Head, in exchange for a donation to a charity that does not exist. Wait till you see the other “non-profits” they’ve created in other states over the years ...

Hard to believe, but I just celebrated 17 years as MidWeek‘s editor. Time flies when you’re working at the best job in the world, and in a company full of good people who care so much about what we do every day ...

This may be my last column before the new year, so let me take this opportunity to wish you and yours a stress-free Christmas season isn’t that one of the definitions of “merry”? and a great 2012 ...

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Remembering Pearl Harbor

We take pride in the stories published in every issue of MidWeek, especially our cover stories and Page 6 features. But I’ll admit to being extra proud of this Dec. 7, 2011, issue the 70th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor.

It starts with Steve Murray’s cover story on members of Ted Tsukiyama, who were students on Dec. 7, 1941, for their recollections of that Day of Infamy, the days that followed and what it was like to be Japanese in Hawaii as their country went to war with a people who “looked like them.” What makes this oral history so uplifting is the way their fellow Hawaii citizens reacted.

In his column, Bob Jones writes about a book written in 1925 that accurately predicted Japan’s attack on Hawaii, and a little known mock attack in 1932 that proved the attack theory doable. It’s quite a read.

Jade Moon, whose father was 8 and growing up in Kalihi on Dec. 7, writes about his recollections, as well as a visit to the peace memorial in Hiroshima. As with Gail Miyasaki’s story, it is ultimately uplifting.

Bob Hogue has a nice Dec. 7 tale with a sports twist, and Jo McGarry writes about the growing popularity of sake here, even as it declines in Japan (who knew?).

I am also quite pleased to introduce a new columnist in this issue Fareed Zakaria whom I regard as good as anyone in journalism today. The editorat-large of Time magazine, host of CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS and the author of two books, Zakaria is an astute and intelligent observer of world events. The New York Times calls his most recent book The Post-American World “a relentlessly intelligent book” and The Economist calls it “a powerful guide” to facing global challenges. Like The Post-American World, his previous book The Future of Freedom was a Times best-seller and has been translated into more than 20 languages. As a political independent, I take pride in bringing MidWeek readers opinions from right, left and in between. Zakaria doesn’t fit any of those labels. Practical, realist, insightful and really smart are terms I’d use instead.

Oh, and speaking of medals: I didn’t have room for this paragraph in my Nov. 16 column on Leo Thorsness, Medal of Honor recipient:

By protocol, when any member of the U.S. military sees a Medal of Honor recipient wearing the medal, they up to and including the commander-in-chief must stop and salute. “It’s not me,” Leo said, “it’s the medal.”

By the way, in an email he sent the day before Thanksgiving, Leo who looks like he could still fit in his old Air Force uniform offered this parting advice for getting through the holidays without gaining weight: “Eat more turkey and less pie.”

 

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Breakfast With An American Hero

One of the most misused words in the English language is hero. That’s especially true in sports, and I say that as a sports fan. As thrilling, for example, as World Series MVP David Freese’s exploits were for his hometown St. Louis Cardinals last month, I would not use the term hero to describe him. According to MidWeek‘s 12-pound office dictionary, a hero is a person “of distinguished courage, admired for his brave deeds and noble qualities.” I would further stipulate that a “brave deed” means risking your life in the service of someone else, not just risking striking out with the bases loaded on national TV.

A couple of Saturdays ago, on the rear deck of the USS Missouri, I enjoyed the distinct honor of having breakfast with a real hero, Leo Thorsness, Medal of Honor recipient.

It was a private event for about 200 people hosted by Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, which is involved nationally at the corporate level with the Medal Of Honor Foundation, to the tune of about $1 million annually. This was, says Gwen Pacarro, senior VP in the Honolulu office of MSSB, the 58th of 60 such events this year hosted by the company around the country.

To put the eliteness and, no, elite is never a bad word (look it up) of Col. Thorsness’ fraternity into perspective: More than 40 million American men and women have served in our active-duty military. Just 3,459 have been awarded the Medal of Honor, 70 percent post-humously, since it was created by Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War. (Twenty Hawaii-born men have received the medal.) And there are only 85 living MoH recipients. Seated to my left for breakfast was one of them, along with his wife Gaylee, daughter Dawn and two young granddaughters adopted from China.

“Hi, I’m Leo,” he said and shook my hand as I sat down. And though I was there to write about him, he was the one doing the interviewing, asking about my work and what first attracted me to it. And, “So what exactly does an editor do?”

A more interesting question is what does it take to deserve the Medal of Honor? Over the years I’ve read many MoH commendations, and each one is inspiring, tear-inducing and leaving one to wonder how our country keeps producing such exceptional people. Here is my new pal Leo’s story, with thanks to the folks at Morgan Stanley, Air Force History Support Office, Air University and POW Network:

Thorsness earned the Medal of Honor for one of the epic solo air battles of the Vietnam War, but didn’t know Congress had awarded it to him until years later. It wasn’t announced publicly because he was a prisoner of war to prevent the North Vietnamese from using the information against him.

Born in February 1932 in Walnut Grove, Minn. “I’m just a Minnesota farm boy” he enlisted in the Air Force in 1951 and earned his commission three years later through the Aviation Cadet Program. He flew F84 Thunderstreaks, F-100 Super Sabres and F-105 Thunderchiefs.

By 1966, the air war in Southeast Asia had taken a new turn as the Soviet Union supplied the North Vietnamese with surface-to-air missiles (SAMs). The Air Force countered the buildup of SAMs with F-105s, flown by aircrews known as “Wild Weasels.” The Weasels’ job was to precede a strike force into a target area, lure enemy SAMs and anti-aircraft radars to come on the air, and knock them out with bombs or missiles that homed on the radar’s emissions. They basically offered themselves as targets for the enemy: Hi there, shoot me!

The presence of Soviet/Russian MiG fighter jets made the job even more dangerous.

Thorsness, then a major, was “Head Weasel” of the 357th Tactical Fighter Squadron at Takhli Air Base in Thailand. On April 19, 1967, he and his backseater Capt. Harry Johnson fought a wild 50minute duel with SAMs, anti-aircraft guns and MiGs. They set out in a formation of four planes. Their target was a heavily defended army compound near Hanoi. Thorsness directed two of the F-105s north and he and his wingman stayed south, forcing enemy gunners to divide their attention.

After initial success destroying two SAM sites Thorsness’ wingman was hit by flak. He and his backseater ejected. Then the two planes he’d sent north were attacked by MiGs. The afterburner of one of the F-105s wouldn’t light, so he and his wingman were forced to return to Takhli, leaving Thorsness to fight solo.

As his F-105 circled the parachutes, relaying their position to the Search and Rescue Center, Johnson spotted a MiG off their left wing. The F-105, though not designed for air-to-air combat, responded well as Thorsness attacked the MiG and destroyed it with a 20-mm cannon, just as another MiG closed on his tail. Low on fuel, Thorsness broke off the battle and rendezvoused with a tanker.

In the meantime, two A-1E Sandys and a rescue helicopter arrived to look for the crewmen. Learning that, Thorsness, with only 500 rounds of ammunition left, turned back from the tanker to fly cover for the rescue force, knowing there were at least five MiGs in the area. As he approached the area, he spotted four MiG-17 aircraft and initiated an attack on them, damaging one and driving the others away from the rescue scene. His ammunition gone, he returned to the rescue scene, hoping to draw the MiGs away from the remaining A-1E.

I asked what he was thinking during all of that.

“There’s no time to think,” he said. “You’re too busy ... Well, there was a moment as we went back (to the rescue site). Harry and I knew there was a 50-50 chance we’d get shot. I said, ‘Well ...’ Harry said, ‘Let’s go.’”

It could very well have been a suicide mission, but just as they arrived so did a U.S. strike force that hit the enemy fighters.

Again low on fuel, he headed for a tanker just as one of the strike force pilots, almost out of fuel himself, radioed him for help. Thorsness knew he couldn’t make Takhli without refueling, but he quickly determined he could make it to Udorn, 200 miles closer, so he directed the tanker toward the strike fighter. Once across the Mekong Delta, Thorsness throttled back to idle and “glided” toward Udorn, touching down exactly as his tanks went dry.

Eleven days later, on his 93rd mission he’d get to go home after 96 Thorsness and Johnson were shot down by a MiG. Both ejected at high speed more than 600 mph Thorsness suffering a severe back injury, “and both my knees were bent out sideways, my helmet was ripped off.” Both men were captured and spent the next six years in North Vietnam prisons. Because of his “uncooperative attitude,” Thorsness was denied medical attention, spent a year in solitary and suffered further back injuries under relentless torture.

On March 4, 1973, both men were released from prison, Thorsness on crutches. Leo’s first words to Gaylee, whose letters to her husband were always returned by the North Vietnamese, bundled, unread and marked “deceased,” say a lot about the man: “Gaylee, I’d have called home sooner, but I got tied up.”

Thorsness completed 23 years in the Air Force and retired in 1973 as a colonel. He is the author of the book Surviving Hell.

I salute you, sir, and thank you for your service and sacrifice and for a singularly memorable morning at Pearl Harbor.

Incidentally, the Medal of Honor Foundation offers teachers a “character development” curriculum. Go to mohfoundation.com or www.cmohedu.org.

 

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Here’s Something To Quack About

Just back from a fantastic trip to Oregon primarily to watch my U of Oregon Ducks football team run over Arizona State before 60,055 people, the largest crowd ever for a sporting event in Oregon.

Returning to Eugene to cheer on the Ducks and take in the majesty of endless trees turning golden and red among the evergreens has become a nearly annual jaunt for me. And for anyone who attended college on the Mainland, I highly recommend a return trip. Dick Grimm, who heads the Hawaii Foodbank, made a similar recent visit to Wisconsin, where he played football. Or if, like Jim McCoy, your child attends school on the Mainland his daughter is at Oregon, along with lots of other isle kids it’s a ton of fun soaking up the excitement of an autumn Saturday football game. And walking across campus, or walking across the footbridge over the Willamette River from campus to Autzen Stadium, stirs up a flood of memories.

When asked why I’m such a Ducks fan, I can offer several reasons, including that they play exciting football, played in last season’s national championship game and are ranked No. 7 at this writing. But the biggest reason is that I am certain I would not be enjoying this wonderful newspaper career and wonderful life if it had not been for my time at the University of Oregon.

But there was much more to this trip than hollering Oooooooo, and I’ll share a few tips for folks who may be traveling that way.

Best Eugene restaurant: Oregon Electric Co., which features the best Steak Diane anywhere. Nice salads, seafood and wine list too.

Best pizza I’ve ever had anywhere: Track Town Pizza on Franklin Boulevard.

The “Decathlon” pizza included a multitude of meats and veggies and was topped with sliced fresh tomatoes, added after cooking perhaps two tomatoes in all on a medium pizza. It’s located directly across from the amazing new Matt Court basketball arena funded by Nike founder Phil Knight and named for his late son. He also built UO’s new law school and named it for his father.

Best fish and chips: Newman’s on Willamette Street. Choices include cod, salmon, halibut and lobster, in a fun, funky ambiance.

One experience, however, I would urge you to avoid. That would be renting a fourwheel all-terrain vehicle (ATV)

from Sand Dunes Frontier to ride the sand dunes just south of the coastal town of Florence. Huge dunes, some rising more than 100 feet, spread across more than 40 miles of the central Oregon coast.

And for the first 20 minutes of what was supposed to be an hourlong ride, we were having a blast. Then, just as I realized that we had strayed out of the ill-defined Frontier area (which is not supervised) and were heading back, my machine conked out. It’s a rather lonely feeling, being stranded in a vast sandy landscape, and realizing nobody had brought a cell phone and that darkness was just a couple of hours away. Fortunately, four Good Samaritans on private ATVs saw us and came to the rescue, towing my machine a mile and a half to a state campground. Our rescuers had a cell, but the folks at Frontier were not answering their phone. A call to 911 led to a call to the state forestry department police. Long story short, we made it back to the Frontier office, but they charged me an extra $100 for returning it late although their machine broke down. Not pleasant folks to do business with, and they obviously need a better mechanic.

Otherwise, the coast was sunny and cloudless for three days. And thanks to my old high school battery-mate from Salem, Terry “Crab Master” Thies, who brought his boat over to Newport Bay and caught 11 Dungeness crabs, which four of us happily consumed while watching Monday Night Football as the sun set over the ocean, washed down with some fantastic Eola Hills (Willamette Valley) Pinot Gris. Life doesn’t get much better.

In Portland, visited both the world-famous Rose Garden which boasts more than 8,000 rose bushes and more than 600 varietals, and where the air is a pure pleasure to breathe and the adjacent Japanese Garden, which is really five different gardens in one and is said to be the most authentic Japanese garden outside Japan. Truly a tranquil place to linger a while.

If you love seafood, Jake’s Famous Crawfish downtown is the place. It has special memories for me my dad took me there as a boy when we attended a ball game or a movie in Portland. But don’t take just my word GQ magazine and The New York Times also rave about the place that has a new menu daily based on what fresh seafood is available, and has been there since 1892.

Also visited former Honolulu and Maui resident Chuck Ryan in the Portland suburb of Lake Oswego, where he runs the highly popular Chuck’s Place coffee shop and bakery. Motto: “Friends don’t let friends drink Starbucks.” And in Lake Oswego I was reminded just how earth-shakingly L-O-U-D steel rail trains are. As we’ll all learn soon enough, apparently.

Oh, a fantastic side trip is 20 minutes east of the Portland airport on I-84 to Multnomah Falls through the Columbia River Gorge, one of America’s grandest geologic features. The falls are really two, totaling 611 feet breathtakingly beautiful.

Anyway, it was good to be gone, great to be back.

 

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Rare Case Of Taking Responsibility

I’ve never been a fan of the Confederate general Robert E. Lee, but watching a Civil War show on The History Channel recently gave me a new respect for his candor and humanity, at least. And a reminder of how rare those two things are in modern American public life.

Lee’s Southern army was coming off a big victory over Union troops in Virginia, and he pressed northward, hoping to reach Philadelphia, and thus convince Northern politicians to give up the war.

But during three days of fighting at Gettysburg in July 1863, Lee made what has been called “the mistake of all mistakes” and lost one-third of his army. Estimates are that more than 4,000 Confederate troops were killed, 12,800 wounded and more than 5,000 missing. (Union losses included 3,155 killed, more than 14,000 wounded and more than 5,000 missing.)

It’s said that the Confederates’ funeral and medical wagon train retreating back to Virginia stretched 17 miles.

And a shaken Gen. Lee, surveying the death and devastation following his misguided order pressing an infantry assault, remarked, “All this has been my fault.”

Wouldn’t you like, just once, for a modern general or politician to stand up and take full responsibility for the lives lost, the bodies disfigured and the families shattered by their ill-considered decisions? ...

* It would go against our company’s ethics code, not to mention my natural inclinations, but if I were to found a political party, I’d call it Middle Class Independents.

Someone has to speak up for us at City Hall, the Capitol and in D.C. ...

* Bob Jones’ recent reporting on the troubles at the Kaua’i Independent Food Bank remind me why a lot of us get into the news biz. There are always many individual reasons a person “takes up the pen,” of course including in my case wanting to write but for many of us it’s also the desire to right wrongs. The Kaua’i food bank’s misuse of $779,000 in federal grant money that should have gone to feeding hungry people, and then selling food for a profit, is a wrong worth righting. Fortunately, as Bob also reported in breaking the story, the statewide Hawaii Foodbank is righting it.

See Jade Moon’s column on page 13 for more on this topic ...

* So whatever happened to mango and lychee season? Or more to the point, what happened to all the mangos and lychees this summer? Those local fruits are two of the best things about summer in Hawaii. Curious, I emailed Duane Choy, who writes about horticultural matters for the Star-Advertiser, and whom I also queried for a recent column item on shower trees.

Sez Duane: “Our unusual weather pattern is a major culprit in the manini fruiting this year.

Unseasonal wet weather is deleterious it stimulates tree growth, but hinders flower production, and can encourage fungus disease with the inflorescence and fruit. And the prolonged windy days we also experienced results in many fruits falling from the tree prematurely.”

I was really enjoying the cool spring and summer we’ve been having, with enough rain I haven’t needed to water my little herb garden as much as past summers. But no mangos or lychee is a tough tradeoff.

In his column on page 73, master sommelier Roberto Viernes reports wine producers in Napa Valley are having a similar problem with grapes this year ...

* Football season is proof that time passes unevenly. Since January, I’ve been awaiting the return of our UH Warriors and my U of Oregon Ducks, time passing excruciatingly slow. Now that the new season is at last upon us, from experience I know how it will go. Each week drags on and on until game day, and then suddenly the season is gone as if in a puff of smoke. Savor the season while you can, fellow fans.

Speaking of sports: Can someone please explain what’s going at 1370AM radio? They have a decent enough lineup of Fox Sports talk hosts, but the station is off the air more than on ...

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Of Pledges, Mail, Seasons, Trees

A bit of this and that, or as we used to say back in the day, dis and dot ...

As an independent, lowercase i because the most charitable description of the way I tend to look at political parties is askance I’ve been appalled at the various “pledges” that some special interest groups have demanded political candidates sign. And even more appalled at the candidates who sign. Because to me the only pledge any of us needs to take is the one that begins, “I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands ...”

I’ve been pleasantly surprised no, amazed at all of the mail I received on my recent column about how America the Beautiful came to be. In fact, nothing I’ve ever written generated as much comment. I was told it was even part of a monthly dinner among a group of friends who gather for conversation on a specific topic, on this occasion patriotic songs. And I learned that “America’s hymn” is sung in Protestant, Catholic and Mormon church services. I’d wager there aren’t many songs of which that can be said ...

Why so much positive response? Just guessing, but it starts with the song’s celebration of what is best about America and in us, what we love most about our country, and what we still want it to be especially at a time when political parties more resemble cults, and seem unable or unwilling to govern for the greater good of all Americans. Plus, it’s just a wonderful song, musically and lyrically. A heart-felt mahalo to all who took the time to read and to respond ...

No offense to friends and associates who’ve sent email messages asking me to join them in various social media, including LinkedIn, all of which I’ve ignored. Sorry, I’m on Facebook and that’s usually more than I can handle in a day. And on Facebook, I don’t “friend” people I don’t know. Yes, I know, old-fashioned ...

With last week’s issue, MidWeek began its 28th year of publishing. Yup, it was July 24, 1984, when that first issue hit Oahu mail boxes, with grinning Joe Moore gracing the cover. Thank you to all half-million or so of you who open the paper each week. I can assure you that our entire staff is dedicated to bringing you a great newspaper every issue. And please support the advertisers who make it possible for us to bring you MidWeek for free, because they are literally paying the bills ...

This is one of my favorite seasons in Hawaii, when colorful shower trees blossom, and delicate petals fall and swirl like snow. It’s also the happy season when a tall tree up my street blossoms with purple flowers in cone-shaped groupings. Not knowing its name, I emailed Duane Choy, who writes about plants and trees for the Star-Advertiser. Duane emailed me back right away. The tree, he says, is variously known as the Queen’s Crape Myrtle or Giant Crape Myrtle, as well as Pride of India. With cool monikers like that, I like it even more.

I also asked Duane about shower trees.

“The rainbow shower tree was adopted as the official city tree of Honolulu in 1965,” he says, detailing our variety of shower trees:

Golden Shower, Yellow Shower, Indian Laburnum (Cassia fistula) from India; Pink Shower, Coral Shower (Cassia grandis) from subtropical America; Pink and White Shower (Cassia javanica) from Indonesia; Rainbow Shower (Cassia x nealiae), a shower tree that was hybridized in Hawaii from Cassia fistula and Cassia javanica.

Duane says there are several “cultivars” (propagated not from seed but from stem cuttings) of rainbow shower trees, including:

Lunalilo Yellow has flower buds that open a bright yellow-orange, and fade to a bright yellow; Queen’s Hospital White has flowers that open pale yellow, and fade rapidly to very light yellow to white; Wilhelmina Tenney, the official city tree of Honolulu, has flowers that open with a deep cerise, fading to paler shades with age, and the insides of petals are yellowish; Nii Gold has flower buds of a deep gold fading to prominent yellow.

I love ‘em all ...

Another season is about to start the golden plovers that departed in late April are due back soon with their “keiki o ka tundra” ...

Which will signal the start of another favorite season: football! ...

And dot’s all, folks ...

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Bob Apisa For Five-0 Governor

Mike Gordon’s entertaining piece in the StarAdvertiser about potential replacements for the governor on Hawaii Five-0 because Jean Smart’s Gov. Pat Jameson was gunned down in the first season finale after being exposed as a traitor in cahoots with Wo Fat got me thinking about other potential candidates.

The next day at our annual gathering of old pals at Duke’s during the Fourth of July Walter Macfarlane outrigger canoe regatta in Waikiki, I came up with the perfect candidate. And so today I am nominating for governor a man I believe to be most qualified Bob Apisa.

His resume is long, broad and strong, but specifically to the point of being governor, Bob actually worked for both Gov. John Burns and Gov. George Ariyoshi at the Capitol as an administrative aide/analyst.

And he got his start in show biz on the old Five0 when he and some friends were hanging around the beach in Waikiki, and he was “discovered” and immediately put to work by Jack Lord, the original Steve McGarrett.

For those too young to remember or for those who never knew or have simply forgotten, here’s a bit more background on Bob, who is among the greatest athletes to come out of Hawaii and one of the most successful in Hollywood of any Hawaii native.

A Farrington High grad, class of ‘64, Bob was allstate in football, basketball and baseball. Speaking to his all-around prowess, during his senior year between games of a double-header, the Farrington track coach drove over and hurried Bob to the Punahou Relays. Wearing baseball pants and cleats, he won both the shot put and 100-yard dash. Let me know the next time someone pulls off that rarefied double.

After starring for the - ahem - Governors, Bob went off to Michigan State, where he and fellow local boys Charlie Wedemeyer and Dick Kenney (the barefoot kicker) starred for MSU’s national championship team in 1966.

Their game against Notre Dame that season, with Bob as the starting fullback, was billed as The Game of the Century.

And it was the first time Islanders had seen an event broadcast “live” on television, thanks to a new communications satellite dubbed Lani Bird by the media. (Previously, games were seen a week delayed.) The game ended in a 10-10 tie. By the way, Bob, one of the original Samoan athletic pioneers, and his teammates will be honored Oct. 22 during the Spartans’ homecoming game against Wisconsin.

After football, a knee injury making an NFL career impossible given medical technology at the time, Bob returned home and got into politics.

He also dabbled in acting until Tom Selleck and Magnum, P.I. came along. That launched him into a career as a stuntman. He would move to Hollywood and become one of the best and most fearless in the stunt game, as he jumped off moving trains, was stampeded by a herd of runaway horses, was set on fire, and thrown through a glass window and fell several stories. He also did a lot of acting. I recall turning on the TV once and seeing Bob leaning out of a helicopter, firing a machine gun.

He would go on to both direct and produce films and TV programs in a show biz career spanning more than 20 years.

Now it’s time to bring him back as governor a straight-shooter who projects strength, intelligence, experience and quiet dignity. Plus, he still looks like he could get you three or four yards from scrimmage every time he touches the ball.

“You know me, I’m not the type to go begging for a role,” Bob said last week before departing with Arlena, his wife of 24 years, for their home in Granada Hills outside Los Angeles. “But if someone offered me the job, I think I’d make a pretty good governor. I’ve been close to two of Hawaii’s best.”

And so I’m proud to lead the campaign cheers:

“We want Bob! We want Bob!”

 

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America The Beautiful’s Back-story

While recently putting the finishing touches on a book about Alexander Joy Cartwright Jr., the father of baseball, and his 1849 Gold Rush journey across North America - which would lead him to Hawaii, where he’d spend the rest of his days as one of the kingdom’s leading citizens - I inadvertently stumbled upon the fascinating back-story of how the great American anthem/hymn America the Beautiful came to be.

Pertinent to the forthcoming book, The Ball That Changed The World, I initially stumbled upon one of the more obscure verses of America the Beautiful. I found its celebration of the pioneers, and its relevance for modern America’s ills, apropos to include in the book:

O beautiful for pilgrim feet Whose stern impassion’d stress

A thoroughfare for freedom beat

Across the wilderness. America! America!

God mend thine ev’ry flaw, Confirm thy soul in self-control,

Thy liberty in law.

The coming Independence Day holiday seems like a good time for sharing, as Paul Harvey might say, the rest of the story about this beautiful song.

It begins in 1893, when Katharine Lee Bates, 33, a poet and English professor at Wellesley College in Massachusetts, from which she had graduated, took a train trip across the continent to Colorado Springs to teach summer school at Colorado College. On weekends she ventured out to enjoy the “purple mountain majesty” of Colorado’s wilds with other faculty. Inspired especially by a climb up 14,000-foot Pike’s Peak - and recalling the passing beauty of the “fruited plain” she’d seen each day on the train - she was inspired to write.

Returning from Pike’s Peak to her room at Antlers Hotel, she began writing a poem she would title Pike’s Peak. As she later explained to friends, many nations have achieved greatness through military might, but Bates believed America’s greatness would be earned in goodness and brotherhood.

Her poem was published originally in The Congregationalist, retitled by its editors America to commemorate Fourth of July 1895, and was immediately popular.

It was still, however, simply a poem.

But then it was inspiringly paired with the perfect music - which already had lyrics, a hymn titled O Mother Dear, Jerusalem by church organist/composer Samuel Augustas Ward, who later retitled it Materna. It’s said that as Bates had been inspired to write her poem, Ward was inspired to compose his tune. It came to him on a ferry from Coney Island back to New York City at the end of a summer day in 1882, 11 years before Bates’ Colorado adventure. Ward was so anxious to write it down, he asked his friend Harry Martin for his shirt cuff to write on.

Bates’ poem set to Ward’s music was first published in 1910 as America the Beautiful, and was instantly and eternally popular. (It had previously been sung to a number of other melodies, including Auld Lang Syne. As late as 1926, the National Federation of Music Clubs sponsored a contest to find a tune that was not so “somber,” but none of the entries were deemed worthy.)

Unfortunately, Ward died in 1903, not knowing he’d helped create a musical national treasure. Fortunately for Bates, by the time she passed away in 1929 the song was already part of our national consciousness. Late in her life she would say, “That the hymn has gained, in these 20-odd years, such a hold as it has upon our people is clearly due to the fact that Americans are at heart idealists, with a fundamental faith in human brotherhood.”

Some have called it America’s hymn, and it’s often been proposed as our national anthem. Devotees of the song prefer its references to the beauty and goodnesss of America to the visions of bloody battle described in Francis Scott Keys’ Star-Spangled Banner.

America the Beautiful is certainly easier to sing.

And though a hymn, it’s not as overtly religious as God Bless America.

A couple of side notes:

In 1972 when President Richard Nixon made his ground-breaking “ping pong diplomacy” visit to the People’s Republic of China, the Chinese played America the Beautiful as welcoming music. Turns out the Chinese characters for United States can be translated as “beautiful country.”

And it turns out that Bates, the daughter of a New England preacher, fell in love with an older Wellesley colleague who headed the economics department, Katharine Coman, and lived happily with her for many years until her partner’s death in 1915. Bates wrote of her love for Coman in her poetry book Yellow Clover.

Here’s another of Bates’ lesser known verses from America the Beautiful, though one that Ray Charles thankfully included in his iconic 1972 recording, which gets my vote for best recorded (and least “somber”) version ever:

O beautiful for heroes prov’d In liberating strife, Who more than self their country loved,

And mercy more than life. America! America!

May God thy gold refine Till all success be nobleness,

And ev’ry gain divine.

Well said, Ms. Bates, well said.

And a happy Independence Day weekend to all.

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Ready When The Time Comes

Thanks to a new Red Cross program, I was one of several MidWeek/Star-Advertiser employees who on a recent Saturday underwent training to help staff Red Cross shelters in times of emergency.

The program, Ready When The Time Comes, utilizes corporate partners and their employees. While it’s new in Hawaii, with MidWeek/Star-Advertiser and Grainger the first to sign up, it’s been successful for some time on the Mainland. Bank of Hawaii also has signed up, and its employees begin training later this month, says Tony Kato, Hawaii Red Cross disaster training and staff services coordinator.

He adds that the Red Cross is looking for more corporate partners to participate in the program.

Briefly, after undergoing training - which I found fascinating - we can be called upon to volunteer in a number of ways. Our initial training was in setting up and running a shelter following a disaster, whether it’s after a flood or fire, or during a hurricane. As Tony explains, when a local, large-scale disaster occurs, the Red Cross calls its partner companies, which then activate their employ-ees/volunteers as directed. Corporate partners pledge to give each trained volunteer at least one day off per year to serve the Red Cross.

Besides opening and managing a shelter, other tasks can include damage assessment, bulk distribution of supplies, helping out on a phone bank and more.

Oahu Publications, our company, got involved because our president Dennis Francis is on the Hawaii Red Cross board of directors.

“It’s often said, and I believe it’s true, that your local newspaper represents the very fabric of the community,” Dennis explains. “So I thought it important for our employees to be ready to assist others should there be an emergency.”

With the triple disaster in Japan so fresh in my mind, I was pleased to have an opportunity to work with this nonprofit organization that despite its priceless civic contributions receives zero government funding - in large part to maintain its independence. While I consider the Red Cross to be as all-American as baseball, cars and cheeseburgers, I found it amazing that it (and the affiliated Red Crescent in Muslim countries) has chapters in 180 countries, with 97 million volunteers worldwide - that’s 96 percent of the Red Cross work force.

No wonder it’s officially known as the International Red Cross/Red Crescent Movement.

And locally the need is endless. Did you know, for example, that there is a home fire in Hawaii every three days? Or that there are 246 hurricane shelters statewide and that in the event of a hurricane it’s estimated 35 percent of the population will need to be evacuated to shelters?

One of the things that was emphasized during our training is the importance of having a personal emergency kit. I’d previously gathered a battery-powered radio, flashlight, rotary phone, candles and bottled water in the back of a closet, but that’s it. At the Red Cross Store - located at Red Cross headquarters on Diamond Head Road at 19th Avenue - Stephanie Alfonso helped me purchase a first aid kit and a personal emergency disaster kit that includes a blanket so thin it fits in a pocket, food bars, water packets, plastic sheeting, duct tape, light sticks and more. I also picked up an emergency radio that includes a builtin flashlight and USB cell phone charger, and a separate flashlight that provides an hour of light with one turn of a small hand crank (it also includes a cell phone charger).

As it turns out, the radio and flashlight came in quite handy that same night when the power went out for a few hours during last week’s big electrical storm - and the batteries for the flashlight I had on hand were dead. (And thank you to the people who called KSSK radio during the power outage to tell all the callers who were grumbling about a few hours of inconvenience to think about folks in Japan, and put things in perspective.)

For more information on volunteer opportunities, the Red Cross Store, the free summer swim program or how to donate, go to hawaiiredcross.org.

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A Blues Man, But A Good Man

I’d hoped to be writing an Old Friends feature on blues legend B.B. King in this week’s issue - he and his band play the Blaisdell Wednesday evening. But when MidWeek requested an interview, B.B.‘s response through a publicist was, “I’m 85, I’m done doing interviews.”

To which I responded, “Can’t blame him.”

Besides, I’ve been fortunate to interview B.B., my all-time musical hero, a few times over the years, including a long and memorable one for a MidWeek cover story prior to his New Year’s Eve 1995 show at the Sheraton-Waikiki. About six weeks before, I’d flown to Memphis to interview B.B. at his eponymous blues club on Beale Street. Having been told I’d have an hour with him, I was appalled as his road manager led me to the dressing room and said, “It’s his 70th birthday weekend. The president just called. We can only give you 10 minutes or so.”

“But you promised me an hour,” I protested, “and I flew all the way from Hawaii.”

“Sorry. Things changed. Lots of people want to talk to B.B.”

So a few minutes into the interview, as he talked about the reason he suddenly ran away from a sharecropper’s job on a white man’s farm in Mississippi in 1946 - sharecropping being a form of indentured servitude - I did something I try never to do in an interview. I interrupted him.

“I’m sorry, Mr. King, I don’t mean to be rude, but I was told I have just a few minutes, and this is the story when you accidentally ran the tractor up under a (raised) house, and it knocked off the exhaust stack, and you got so scared you left without telling Mr. Johnson Barrett, and you and a friend hitchhiked up to Memphis with nothing but a few coins and a sausage in your pocket, right?”

He leaned back in surprise, eyes going wide. Then he smiled. “Oh, you know that story, do you?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You did your research.” “I tried to.”

“Well, then ...”

So a few minutes later when the road manager returned to say my time was up, B.B. waved him away, and I ended up spending 90 minutes with the great man, asking every question I’d scripted in my notebook, and then some. I also got to spend some time with him backstage after that New Year’s Eve concert and did two telephone interviews, including when he’d checked into a Los Angeles hotel and I had to ask the hotel operator for the room of “Cannonball Jackson.”

Oh, there are a couple of things I would like to ask B.B. now, if given the opportunity. I’d like to know why, at his age, he’s still touring. I’m guessing the response would be similar to what he said back in 1995 when I asked why he’d performed more than 300 nights a year for many years, including 342 onenighters in 1956, and at age 70 was on pace to do 250 shows - and this year will do 125 - making him literally the hardest-working man in show business (sorry, James Brown).

“I always had a band to support,” he said simply. (During those years of non-stop touring, by the way, he survived 17 traffic accidents.) And his fans need to hear him: “I choose to play the blues, and I think I can make people happy doing that. The blues is a tonic that’s good for you.”

And when we talked in Memphis, he said he’d recently gone semi-vegetarian after learning he had diabetes, and was feeling better than he had in years. I don’t have the exact quote, but it was along the lines of, “I want to keep on playing the blues for as long as I can.” Sixteen years later, I’d like to ask about some of his diet specifics and favorite dishes.

And I’d especially like to ask if, at 86, he looks at love any differently than he did as a young man writing and singing mostly about male-female relationships. Seeing how much my friend and former colleague Eddie Sherman - who is just about the same age as B.B. - is in love with his wife Patty, how happy he is and how she has helped him watch his diet and deal with his own diabetes, I’m guessing that B.B. would say something similar to what he did in that Memphis interview:

“I sing mostly about love. There’s hardly anybody alive that don’t want to be loved.”

When I asked if he knew something that Sigmund

Freud did not - Freud once famously lamented, “What do women want?” - B.B. grew thoughtful:

“What does a woman want? Love. Respect. Most of them want to feel that they are special. And I think most of them want to be treated like a woman. I don’t think they really want anything more than we men do.”

Finally, I’d like to ask about his legacy. Again, I’m guessing it would sound a lot like an answer he gave me at his club, when I noted that he must be the only man in show business without an enemy in the world:

“It’s like the saying about the country boy - you can take the boy out of the country, but you can’t take the country out of the boy. Well, I’m like that with the church. A Japanese reporter asked me one of the best questions I ever thought about. See, I don’t drink, haven’t had a drink in eight or nine years, not even a beer. I might swear if I’m among a small group of friends, but otherwise I don’t use it. It’s not allowed on the stage. Nobody can ever say they heard me even say ‘damn.’ So this Japanese writer said, ‘You don’t drink, you don’t smoke, you don’t do a lot of things blues singers are known for doing, so it’s like a gospel singer singing the blues.’ Well, I am religious, not a Jesus freak as the kids say, but I do believe in God. I’m a guy who believes in treating you the way I want to be treated. That’s just B.B. King.

“And it’s not that I think I’m going to die tomorrow. You know, a lot of people get very religious in the end. But I’ve been like this most my life. I’m a blues man, but I’m a good man. I wasn’t trying to set no example. All my life I’ve just been that one person - I didn’t have no brothers or sisters to help me. So to stay out of trouble, you didn’t do anything to get people beatin’ up on you.”

Correction: Last week I referred to the planned train chugging from the leeward side to town and back. In fact, there will be two tracks, one running each way.

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Bringing Train Culture To Honolulu

As mentioned in a recent column, one of the things that most impressed me during a visit to Japan that ended eight days before the March 11 earthquake and tsunami was the trains. As my friend Kamasami Kong said, they are so punctual “you can set your watch by the trains.”

I thoroughly enjoyed the ease of getting around by train and subway - the JR East company alone has 36 different lines in Tokyo, with infinite connections - though I wouldn’t try it without a local guide. And I didn’t venture onto a train during peak rush hours, when cars are jammed so tight with commuters they make a sardine can seem elbow-roomy spacious, and train employees called “pushers” literally push and shove bodies into train cars to get maximum ridership - much like those competitions in the 1960s to see how many college kids could cram into a Volkswagen.

At morning and afternoon rush hours, by the way, certain cars are designated women-only, because so many ladies old and young have reported being groped on co-ed cars - though in the smashed-up conditions it’s hard to tell by whom.

Even the ladies’ cars are so jammed that reading a book, much less newspaper, is impossible. You’re lucky to have room to hold your cell phone inches from your face. (You’ll know the ladies-only cars by the pink line on the platform where they queue up.)

And it seems everyone, even the elderly, have their noses stuck in a cell phone on the train or on the platform waiting for a train, either texting, apping or playing games. I noted zero social interaction among strangers on trains.

Japan’s “train culture” got me thinking about trains in Honolulu, and how they’ll inevitably affect our social interactions and how we go about our daily lives - assuming solutions can be found for the many problems, both financial and ethical, the Star-Advertiser‘s Dave Shapiro pointed out in his April 6 column.

There are differences between Hawaii and Japan, of course, starting with this: Instead of multiple trains and tracks, initially we’ll have one train that will chug from the leeward side to town, then chug back out again. And commuter trains have been running in Tokyo for more than a hundred years - I visited a historic train car in bustling Shibuya plaza that serves as a mini-museum. And Japan’s people are famously polite. The jerk who cuts you off in H-1 traffic is the same jerk who will elbow past to get a seat. Talk about social interactions. Perhaps nothing speaks to the differences between Honolulu and Tokyo more than the amazing number of young schoolchildren traveling alone on trains, as young as 7 or 8, something I would never have considered for my kids.

Once we have that one train, of course, others will follow. Having invested the billions of dollars required for that one short line, trains to the Windward side, the North Shore and Hawaii Kai will have to be built. Like the financial institutions taxpayers had to bail out, the train’s initial cost will be “too big” not to link with new routes.

And make no mistake about this: Trains by their nature are l-o-u-d.

While getting to and from places via train and subway was convenient in Tokyo, taking along anything other than a purse, small backpack or computer bag was not.

And trains don’t take you right to your door, which means we’ll have an increase in park-and-ride parking lots. How much will it cost to park, and will the city provide security for the inevitable break-ins that characterize our most popular visitor areas?

If you’re not using a park-and-ride lot at or near a train station, you’ll likely be taking a bus in addition to the train, TheBus delivering you kind-of-close to work or home.

It’s worth noting that bicycle ridership is remarkably high in Tokyo, among old and young alike - not as exercise but as a basic mode of transportation. So extensive bike racks are provided at train stations. Will we be building more bike lanes that connect with train stations? Bike racks also present a security issue - not so much in Japan, where crime rates are low, but certainly it does here where petty criminals abound.

All of which raises another question for those of us who tend to stop by a grocery store on the way home to get something fresh for dinner. Do you want to schlep grocery bags on a train, bus or bike, or walking home after disembarking?

As for stations, some in Tokyo double as shopping complexes, such as Seijogakuenmae in Setagayu-ku, which includes a book store, clothing shop and the upscale grocery store Odakyo OX.

And while the aforementioned “pushers” may sound like a Japanese anomaly, rail proponents here note that each car will have seating for 72 people, and as many as 300 people can stand in a car at once. I can think of more relaxing ways to go home at the end of a long day. And while I found standing on trains fine for short hops - rides of 10-15 minutes - it didn’t take long for the arm that’s reaching up to hold a steadying grip dangling from the ceiling to “fall asleep.” And trains tend to lurch from side to side, so you’re always adjusting your balance. Again, OK for a short ride.

A final consideration: Honolulu’s proposed train, like those in Tokyo, will run on electricity. What happens when the power is out for hours (known to happen here from time to time)? As folks in Tokyo can tell you post-quake, trains don’t run, and workers spend the night in their offices or at stations waiting for a train.

These are all questions I’d never considered until visiting Japan and experiencing its high train culture. I raise them here now because, well, nobody else has, and it seems our train is coming.

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A Japan Visit Just Before The Quake

What follows is a column I wrote after a visit to Japan in February and March, one of the greatest vacation weeks of my life, which included one of my best birthday celebrations. But eight days after I departed Tokyo, just as MidWeek was ready to go to press, the March 11 earthquake and tsunami hit Japan. I pulled the column, deciding to wait until the situation there was improved to publish my account. That day, sadly, now seems far in the future, especially with the threat of radiation poisoning in and around Tokyo. I loved everything about Japan - the food, the people, the equal embrace of the traditional and the modern. So I offer this now, a sort of tribute to the Japan I experienced and fell in love with, and with a deep hope that life there will soon be much closer to “normal.”

What a difference a new airport makes. In this case, Tokyo International Airport at Haneda. It’s not new new, but it is a new destination for Hawaiian Airlines, and made a huge quality-of-vacation contribution to my recent Japan visit.

Instead of three inconvenient hours of ground travel (train-train-bus) and suitcase schlepping to get from and to Narita, it was just 45 minutes from Haneda to my destination. Which translates to a total of four and a half more hours of eating sushi and drinking sake - or whatever else you’d rather be doing besides sitting in Tokyo traffic.

Haneda also provides another opportunity to fly what, in my experience, is the best airline in the world these days. Yes, Hawaiian, and not just because of its superlative on-time record or that it’s local. The level of customer service, both on the ground and in the air, should be the goal of every Hawaii company. And the few times I’ve upgraded to business class, well, it doesn’t get any better.

For sure, this will not be my last trip to Japan via Haneda (where security does not make you remove your shoes).

One of the highlights of this trip was seeing my old friend Kamasami Kong, the former Honolulu deejay. He’s huge in Asia, doing radio shows in Tokyo, Osaka and Taipei, and publishing a magazine. Every big-name star coming through Japan makes it a point to appear on one of his shows. And he hosts “World Pop Network: Japan” on one of Hawaiian’s music channels. Kong’s Tokyo gigs include a Saturday morning Hawaiian music show. Yes, it was a bit odd hearing the Ka’u Crater Boys, Loyal Garner and Anuhea in Japan, but kind of cool too.

The previous night Kong provided a walking tour of Shibuya, the super-hip area of Tokyo where 75 percent of people seem to be under age 30. The main intersection - bounded by tall buildings with five or six huge video screens blasting music; “girl bands” are the in thing now, from both Japan and Korea - is said to be the most populous place on earth, with about 2.5 million people transiting the four-way crossing in any 24-hour period. Stepping off the curb into the multi-directional pedestrian crossing is a rather intimidating event - but exciting too - with literally thousands of people pouring into the intersection. A literal flood of humanity.

Our evening ended at nearby Gonpachi, the restaurant Quentin Tarantino recreated for that sword fight scene in Kill Bill (Kong’s guest the previous Friday was Sam Choy). Manager Kenji Sato (who is of Japanese-Cuban heritage and looks like his last name ought to be Iglesias) runs a place with great food and fun attitude.

Another highlight was visiting Meguro Gajoen - since 1931 a receptacle of Japan’s traditional arts. So remarkable is its collection that during the World War II bombing of Tokyo, Doolittle’s Raiders were ordered to avoid that area of the city to prevent damaging Meguro Gajoen and its “100 stairs” of traditional culture.

Remarkably, just a few steps away from the electric Shibuya intersection is the Meiji Jingu shrine, a huge wooded oasis of 120,000 trees (365 varieties), nature paths, babbling streams and placid lakes. It’s dedicated to the late Emperor Meiji, one of Japan’s most enlightened and generous leaders, and his consort Empress Shoken.

The close proximity of the Meiji Jingu shrine to Shibuya is Japan in a clam shell - exquisitely traditional, extremely modern, each offering its own varied pleasures.

And while I was a bit early for sakura (cherry blossom) season, pink and white ume (plum) blossoms were everywhere - delicate but hardy enough to withstand overnight temperatures that approached freezing.

There were many other highlights: a huge orchid show at the Tokyo Dome that covered the entire stadium floor; lunch across from the Tokyo Dome at the Baseball Cafe, which is dedicated to U.S. baseball; being photographed with Godzilla outside Toho Studios in Setagaya-ku; Jidayuburi Park’s historic Japanese village, including an 1800s wine shop and fire station; the stunning mountain resort of Hakone (90 minutes by train from Tokyo) and soaking in an ofuro; taking the Hakone Ropeway “gondora” (as the sign there called it) which carries more than 2 million people annually to the sulphur-steaming volcanic Owakudani mountain; visiting The Little Prince Museum at Hakone, with its European gardens and cafe (yes, a museum in Japan dedicated to the book by a French author); seeing majestic Mount Fuji (or Fuji-san, as Japanese folks respectfully call it), and enjoying fantastic food at every meal.

This trip was also my introduction to “train culture,” especially commuter trains. Japan’s are so good, you can set your watch by the trains! I’ll share a few thoughts on that, and how it might translate to Honolulu, in a coming column.

Post-script: As it happens, Hawaiian’s Haneda service has been invaluable in allowing both Americans and Japanese to flee the constant aftershocks, the threat of radiation, the rolling blackouts and inconsistent train service ... Though built before Tokyo structures were mandated to be earthquake-proof, Meguro Gajoen survived with its treasures intact, and several events previously scheduled there have become fund-raisers for tsunami relief ... Among the accomplishments for which Empress Shoken is so beloved even today is that she helped bring the Red Cross to Japan. Thank goodness she did ...

 

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A Few Last Words From Frenchy

It was a sunny Saturday in February 1998 when I sat down with Frenchy DeSoto at Makua beach - as informal a setting for a MidWeek cover story interview as any. She was, at the time, the Office of Hawaiian Affairs chairwoman. Make that the outspoken and often controversial OHA chairwoman. Hearing news of her recent death at age 81, reading others’ comments on her life and contributions to Hawaii, I had two immediate thoughts: First, one of the best things about my business is the opportunity to get to know history makers in ways that most folks can’t. Second, I wanted to give Frenchy one last chance to speak in the pages of MidWeek. What follows is a condensed version of that cover story, plus one more anecdote.

To help put a fractured people and a fractured culture back together again, Frenchy DeSoto may be the perfect leader. The chairwoman of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs knows fractured. She also knows about making the fractured whole again.

“My full-Hawaiian mother never raised me,” DeSoto said. “My maiden name was French, and my German father killed himself when I was 6. The court took us away from our mother. I was raised from foster home to foster home, and I ran away from every single one of them. There must have been 17 or 16, like that.

“I ran away because I was looking for my brother and my two sisters. I’d find out where they were and I’d walk. One time I found my brother in Kaimuki in the Salvation Army boys home. I walked from Kalihi to Kaimuki to get him. He was feeding pigs. And then they took him up to the dorm and tied his leg to the bed frame (so he couldn’t leave). I climbed up the back stairway and lifted up the bed frame, so you could slip the rope off, and then I removed it off of him and put him on my back, and away we went. I must have been about 9, he was 7.

“That’s why I created my own family,” she added, a tear creeping into the corner of an eye. “And then I fought everybody that crossed it.”

Ultimately, the ohana for whom she would fight extended to all native Hawaiians, and to all who are powerless and wronged by the powerful.

“So that’s why I get so emotional perhaps,” she continued that day in the shade at Makua. “That when I speak of people starving, it’s not an intellectual exercise, Don. When I speak of the pain of children, it’s not another exercise of brain-wave patterns.

“But I was tough. I shined shoes on Bethel Street when I ran away. I hawked newspapers that I stole. Got enough money to buy a book. And people would get so angry with me. Most people, they get money, they buy food, and I’d buy a book. I loved Shakespeare. I found a kinship with a broken soul. It was part of glossing over the pain ... I tried to build a front of toughness.”

It’s telling that this hard-charging woman who knew no back-down married a champion motorcycle racer and was the mother of perhaps Hawaii’s top motorcycle racer, John DeSoto, who went on to become a Honolulu councilman. Politics, he got from Mom. Fearless, he got from both sides.

“They called him Cobra,” Frenchy said of her husband, John Sr. “He is second generation from Puerto Rico, born on the Big Island. Plantation people, Peepeku. When I met him, he was one of the few human beings who was very kind to me. We met down at the Natatorium - I was swimming, also working at St. Francis. All the motorcyclists would hang out at the Natatorium. This other Hawaiian boy, Joe Peters, who I knew casually, my girlfriend was going with him, and she introduced me to my husband. He took me riding motorcycles. He had a Harley at that time, ‘61.”

Together they had “six children of my own plus raised four more. In Hawaiian, they’re called luhi - you raise ‘em, you don’t adopt ‘em: Japanese girl, Filipino boy, haole boy and Hawaiian boy ... I don’t care about the color.”

She ventured into politics in the most grassroots of ways:

“I think because I have a lot of children, I became involved in what they did and started from there, recognizing that there needed to be changes - such as corporal punishment in the schools. I noticed that when my children were younger, going to school, they didn’t spank children in Hawaii Kai - they spanked them in Waianae. Very subtle, and yet not too subtle discrimination in my view. That was my first success. Of course I’ve never, ever done any of this by myself. I never could have. It was a lot of people who thought like I did, who committed like I did, to making a small difference.

“I did the PTA and then I quit when, at one meeting, teachers and parents sat around talking and talk-

ing about why Johnny wrote an obscenity on the bathroom wall. Nobody thought of going and asking this damn kid what the hell he did and why it was wrong. So I thought, (expletive), this is certainly a lot of waste of time. And I understood then that a lot of people are more interested in retaining the status quo, if you will. They’re not ready to be creative.

“I got into trouble when I was young - I had a violent temper. Some people still accuse me of

that, but I think I have mellowed, to the point where sometimes people mistake my kindness for weakness. Now that is a big problem - for them.”

I was fortunate never to have been an adversary of Frenchy’s, and over the years we developed what I’d call a warm professional relationship. One of the things the public didn’t usually get to see was her sense of humor, which could be self-deprecating, or her kolohe nature.

“I was born at St. Francis, and a Dr. Hays delivered me,” she said in that cover interview. “And it was told to me that he was ‘rather inebriated’ when he delivered me. It’s wonderful for me, because I always have an excuse to fall back on when I start acting stupid!”

Some years later, working on a story that involved Hawaiian aumakua, family gods, I called to ask about her aumakua - and never have a deity and a human been so perfectly paired.

“Oh, my aumakua is the elements - wind and rain, waves and storms,” she said, excitement rising in her voice. “So if I’m out at sea on a boat, and the wind is blowing and the rain is coming down sideways, and the ocean is rough, I’m never scared.”

And here she laughed a rascal laugh.

“Some people might call me a dirty old woman, but when I’m out there in the elements like that, surrounded by all that power, it’s a very sensual, kind of sexual thing.”

She laughed that laugh again. Aloha, Frenchy, and mahalo for all your good work for Hawaii. May ka makani forever blow your way.

 

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The End Of A Life, And Great Rivalry

The words used to describe that Sunday, Nov. 14, at Hanalei Bay just begin to tell the story: Awesome, amazing, emotional, unforgettable, chickenskin. So too do the handmade signs on the highway, such as the one on Page 86 - a full page of photos in tribute to the late Andy Irons.

As the surfing world in general, and the island of Kauai in particular, looked back at the life of Andy Irons, who died tragically while traveling back to Hawaii and whose ashes were scattered at Pine Trees, the break where he learned to surf, so too did we at MidWeek.

Andy twice appeared on MidWeek‘s cover - Jan. 3, 2003, in a tuxedo, after winning his first world title, and Nov. 19, 2003, as he and Kelly Slater went into the final events of the year in a battle for the title. The cover photo showed Irons and Slater wearing boxing gloves. (A few folks have appeared on MidWeek‘s cover more than once, but Irons is the only person to do so twice in one calendar year.) An inside photo showed them bare-knuckled, laughing, but throwing sucker punches as well. Both of those photos also are on Page 86.

I wrote that second story, interviewing Irons at Turtle Bay, and like many who met him was taken by how “in the moment” he was, thoughtfully answering questions. The same can be said of Slater.

Much of that story focused on the rivalry between the two, including this segment:

In planning the photo shoot for the cover, an associate of Irons said, “You won’t have any trouble getting them to sneer at one another.” An associate of Slater said, “They put those gloves on, be careful, they just might start going.”

“We’re cool,” Irons says of Slater. “Kelly is the surf god. I have the ultimate respect for him. He’s the Michael Jordan of surfing. To be up there with him in the rankings is an honor.”

But he adds: “On the beach, friendship is one thing. In the water it’s different.”

“Competition is a tough thing,” says Slater. “As guys, we compete for a lot of things, from girls to money to careers. I have brothers, so I grew up competing.

“By the nature of what we do, and our positions now, yeah, Andy and I are very competitive. But we have a deep respect for each other. At the same time, we’d probably be much better friends if we weren’t competing. He reminds me of my older brother, they have a lot of the same traits.

“It’s not a negative rivalry, just the opposite, it’s quite healthy. We never pass without saying hello.”

Despite Slater’s slight points lead in ‘03, Irons would win the final event of the year, the Pipeline Masters, to win the second of his three consecutive world titles.

Slater, who this year won his 10th world title, has said the rivalry “made me who I am,” and that he would not have won as often if he weren’t competing with Andy. It’s also fair to say Andy would not have been Andy without Kelly.

See Ron Mizutani’s column on Page 32 (Click here) for more on Irons, and another great photo.

An Oahu ceremonial paddle-out/memorial for A.I. will happen Dec. 8 at Pipeline.

Click Here to see more Andy’s photos

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Which Services Don’t You Want?

There’s been a lot of talk recently about the size of government - recently, in this case, meaning since about, oh, 1776. Today’s Tea Party folks seem to think that big, bloated government is the root of all that ails us. President Obama seems to think that there is no problem too big (or small) for government to fix.

This may, in fact, be the longest running debate in the United States: What exactly is the role of government in our lives, what services do we want it to provide and how much do we want to pay for it? Because once you have a Constitution and 27 amendments to it, the first 10 of which comprise our Bill of Rights, you assume a government to protect and enforce those rights - in short, to govern.

The subject of government size and reach most recently came up in the debate over health care and health insurance. I recall one anti-Obama guy shouting at a person in a wheelchair at an Ohio rally, “Health care is not a right!”

And I wondered: What about public education - is that a right?

Good roads and street lights? Bike paths?

Clean running water? Health and sanitation - garbage collection and landfills? Flu vaccines?

Public safety - cops, fire-fighters and EMTs? Jails and prisons?

Tsunami and hurricane warning systems?

Parks and pools? Libraries?

Airports and harbors? Sewage treatment?

Bus service?

A train?

Where do we draw the line? And at what point exactly does government get “too big”?

I couldn’t help thinking about these questions when I was asked to help judge the annual Governor’s Awards for state workers, which will be presented tomorrow afternoon (Oct. 7) at the Capitol. In reading through a thick notebook with 49 multipage nominations in three categories - employee, manager and team - I was repeatedly amazed first by the intelligence, creativity and dedication of so many state workers, and second because I didn’t realize all the varied things state workers do.

Without giving away the winners - judges are sworn to silence until tomorrow - here are just a few of the examples that most impressed me. There were so many, in fact, we judges asked Gov. Lingle to name runners-up in each category for the first time, which she agreed to do.

* When coqui frogs were first found at a Waimanalo nursery in the summer of 2009, Derek Arakaki of the Agriculture Department and his team sprayed citric acid on the site, which ended the horrific shrill cries of the nocturnal coquis. Nocturnal, meaning Arakaki and his team worked a lot of nights. Over the next 11 months, coquis were found at seven other sites around Oahu, and in each case, the Ag folks able to stop the infernal, sleep-disrupting frogs. Having been kept awake all night by coquis in Hilo a couple of years ago, to me this is a real quality-of-life contribution.

* The importance of work done by Kevin Richards and colleagues in the Defense Department was emphasized on Feb. 27, the day of our tsu-mini. Although big waves never came, the tsunami inundation remap-ping they had performed played a part in evacuation plans. Their two annual tsunami test alerts also played a part in the orderly official response.

* Similarly, George Burnett, a manager with Civil Defense, was instrumental in securing $14.2 million in federal funds to upgrade and maintain our outdoor siren warning system, including installation of solar-power warning sirens. He also found a way to reach deaf and hearing-impaired citizens in times of emergency.

* Foster kids throughout Hawaii have a great friend in Lynne Kazama of Human Services. With many foster kids being native Hawaiian, she actively recruited would-be foster parents through Hawaiian organizations. She also set up the Leeward side’s first protective receiving home for kids removed from their families. And she helped establish a program so foster kids can stay in touch with siblings and other supportive family members.

* Ernest Lau, a manager with Accounting and General Services, was responsible for a plan that will cut energy and water usage at 10 state buildings in the downtown area by 30 percent, saving about $3 million a year. Lau’s DAGS staff was also nominated for team of the year.

* Any parent who is supposed to receive monthly child support payments knows what a hassle it can be, including waiting for checks in the mail. Gary Kemp, a manager in the Attorney General’s office, expanded the use of direct deposit for recipients, as well as creating a program in which recipients use debit cards to receive payments. He also coordinated with cell phone providers to use cell phone information to locate deadbeat parents.

* The AG team was also nominated - the debit card program saves the state $130,000 annually in paper, postage and banking fees while better serving clients. The agency had previously processed 1,800 checks every business day.

* Hawaiian Homelands has been a bitter point of contention for many native Hawaiians, but Mona Kapaku, a manager in HHL, works so tirelessly for home-land beneficiaries and those on waiting lists, they have asked in public meetings that she continue to represent them. This is, as her nomination said, “unprecedented.”

* Ronald Randall, a manager with Taxation, helped set up the Fresh Start program that allows individuals who had not filed taxes or under-reported income to come forward and pay the taxes without fearing prosecution. The result: $14 million for the state, including settlements.

* Say what you will about federal stimulus dollars, but Jeff Chang, a manager with Transportation’s Airports Division, helped secure $47 million to upgrade Honolulu International Airport, including installation of solar panels. At seven DOT facilities statewide, solar panels will produce 1.2 billion kilowatt hours - enough to power 150 homes for a year.

* As my pharmacist father used to say about doctors, 50 percent of them graduated in the bottom half of their class. The Doctor Discipline team in Commerce and Consumers Affairs came up with some creative ways to prevent bad doctors from practicing, by working with the state Medical Board to allow voluntary surrender of a medical license as an alternative to revocation or suspension. This led to quicker resolution of cases and less staff time consumed.

Also working with the Medical Board, and having found that mere fines were not enough to change the behavior of bad docs, they began recommending in certain cases probation and long-term monitoring of proven bad docs. Hawaii thus jumped from a national worst No. 51 in physician discipline to 10th.

* Part of Olomana School’s role in the DOE is to provide classes at the Youth Correctional Facilities in Kailua. The team came up with an out-of-the-box way of rotating kids through educational programs, which cut down conflicts and other distractions, while expanding education into graphic arts, welding and agriculture.

* The Health Department’s H1N1 flu team’s response reads like a medical mystery novel, with testing at multiple labs. Critics might say that the “swine flu” never materialized into the pandemic many feared, but you can also argue the rapid response of health officials had a lot to do with that.

* Hawaii farmers who grow and export flowers were in danger of going out of business - worth $54 million annually just on the Big Island - when California suspended all shipments after finding several nematodes (roundworms) in shipments. The Plant and Environmental Protection Sciences team’s creative - and seemingly counter-intuitive - measure of dipping plants into 120-degree water for 12 minutes killed the worms, and actually increased plant shelf life. The team also took up the fight against coqui frogs, published 55 scientific papers and generated nearly $2 million in federal grants.

OK, so this may not be the most exciting column I’ve ever written, or you’ve ever read. But that’s government work - unless you’re a policy wonk, it’s usually not very exciting. We in Hawaii are fortunate to have so many good people working (and wonking) for us.

As for the questions posed at the beginning of this column, you’ll find no answers here. That’s for you to decide for yourself - which of these services do you want, and which don’t you want?

But I do hope this column leads to a greater understanding of what our state government does, and contributes to a reasonable and civil conversation among fellow citizens on this most essential of American arguments.

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A Great Event; Trophy Time Again

For the third year, MidWeek will again be involved in the Hawaii International Women’s Leadership Conference, which happens Sept. 21 at the Sheraton Waikiki. And I’m such a believer in the value of the conference, I’d like to encourage both individuals and companies to get involved too.

Our former staffer Linda Dela Cruz was the first to mention the conference to me several years ago - this will be the seventh annual - and when I attended the ‘08 conference it took about two minutes to realize what a fantastic event it is. I regard it as one of the most important annual events in Hawaii. Every year more than a thousand attendees get to hear presentations from an remarkable cast of women, and get to meet and mingle with them later. This year’s speakers include Li Xiaolin, vice chair of China’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries (essentially secretary of state); Jin Kyu Robertson, who left a factory job in Korea and moved to the U.S. with $20 and very little English, and through hard work and determination became a U.S. Army major and earned a Ph.D. from Harvard; Dr. Connie Mariano, the first Filipino-American to become a Rear Admiral in the Navy and first military woman to serve as White House physician, caring for George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton; Sister Rosemary of Uganda, a nun who set up a tailoring school for former child soldiers, orphans and women forced into sexual slavery by the Lord’s Resistance Army, and Lindsay Phillips, a successful business woman who received her first patent while still in high school. That’s just a brief sampling.

Our involvement will be to again judge the essay contest. I’m always amazed at the inspiring stories written by women about the women who inspired them. It’s tough to pick a winner with so much chicken skin going on.

Conference organizers hope - and I would encourage - individuals and companies to buy seats or tables for their employees or to sponsor high school and college students. Every year women return to the conference with stories of how they were inspired by speakers, and moved to work harder or try new approaches, and came away more successful and more fulfilled. The theme this year is “Business UNusual: Women Changing the Paradigm.”

For more details on the conference and the essay contest, and to register, go to: hawaiiwomensconference.com.

I’m pleased to report that MidWeek recently brought home some more awards and trophies. First, Amy Alkon, the “Advice Goddess,” won several awards at the Los Angeles Press Club’s Southern California Journalism Awards, including a first place award in the “commentary” category and an honorable mention for “Journalist of the Year.”

Here at home, Dick Adair’s editorial cartoon “North Korea” took top honors in the local Society of Professional Journalists awards competition. Dick’s says-it-all toon shows a crying, hungry baby in front of a woman with nuclear bombs for breasts.

And - blush - yers truly’s account of The Eddie surf contest at Waimea Bay last December took first in the SPJ’s sports reporting category. As I replied to a nice e-mail from Dave Reardon of the Star-Advertiser, who took second in sports columns, with guys riding 40- to 50-foot waves on a gorgeous day and 30,000 people lining the bay, I was just trying not to screw it up.

Whew ...

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The Generosity Of MidWeek Readers

Most of us who get into this crazy business of journalism do so with a sense of wanting to serve our society’s greater good. Although it’s hard to quantify, I do believe that by bringing people both news and opinions that cover a broad spectrum newspapers do serve the greater good and help promote a stronger, more informed democracy.

Sometimes the results of what we do are easier to measure. Such as the fallout from Carol Chang’s June 16 cover story, “Hawaii Schools’ Best Friend,” on Kathie Wells and Community Helping Schools. In case you missed that one, Kathie started CHS to fulfill specific requests for equipment and supplies from public school teachers because the DOE budget doesn’t come close to covering everything they need.

 

According to her, as a result of our story an amazing list of goods and services have been offered. “Because MidWeek reaches everybody, we’ve gotten so many calls,” Kathie says. “We’re starting to get partnerships, which is what we really need. I’m meeting with a Rotary club, a boutique, a loan office.” They’ve also received a radial saw, piano and teak desk, and a group of UH ROTC students who are majoring in engineering and science have offered to write grant proposals and tutor kids in science and math at schools.

We’ll take credit for publishing the story, but the real credit goes to Wells and her team of volunteers, and to MidWeek readers who responded to the story with overwhelming generosity.

The response of our civic-minded readers also made possible an award MidWeek received recently. At the CrimeStoppers annual luncheon on June 16, we received the print media award for the Most Wanted cover story that was published March 3, as well as for the weekly CrimeStoppers feature that began in the following issue. HPD Sgt. Kim Buffett mentioned that nine of the 12 crooks pictured on the cover - each involved in identity theft - have been captured, and that the other three are known to be on the Mainland. Combined with fugitives pictured in the weekly feature, MidWeek and our readers are responsible for putting 35 bad guys and gals behind bars in the past four months.

“It’s amazing,” Sgt. Buffett says, “as soon as people start getting their MidWeeks, the calls to our hotline start coming in.”

I wish our readers could have been at the luncheon to share in the genuine warmth and gratitude expressed by a number of officers, including HPD Chief Louis “Call me Louie” Kealoha.

(Kudos also to Marisa Yamane from KHON and the 98.5-FM morning crew of Rory Wilde, Gregg Hammer and Crystal Akana, who received TV and radio awards from CrimeStoppers.)

And then there are times we contribute to the general good by publishing good stories about good people doing good things. No, in this case, make that great things. Former state Chief Justice William Richardson was such a person. The man for whom the UH law school is named graced our cover on Feb. 10, and last week he passed away at age 90. I’m glad we were able to tell the story of one of the people who literally helped shape modern Hawaii for the better. We join all of Hawaii in offering condolences to his family. The cover headline on that issue bears repeating now: “Well Done, Sir.”

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Two MW Toonists Take Top Honors

Congratulations to MidWeek editorial cartoonists Roy Chang and Dick Adair!

Because during the annual Hawaii Publishers Association Pa’i Awards luncheon at the Hilton Hawaiian Village last Thursday, Roy’s “Gnaws” toon from Dec. 16 took top honors for best editorial cartoon of 2009.

And Dick’s “North Korea"from July 22 earned second place. (John Pritchett of Honolulu Weekly was third.)

Judges for the competition - 33 categories for both newsprint and glossy stock publications - were Mainland journalists, chosen to avoid local prejudices. Here are their comments about the two MidWeek contributors.

Regarding Dick’s toon: “This might be one of the strongest and most uncomfortable editorial cartoons in the recent history of the Pa’i Awards. It requires no caption, utterly no explanation. Local (subject matter) comments are usually strongest, but this stark cartoon depiction of starvation and nuclear proliferation speaks very loudly. The cartoon is hard to describe but equally hard to forget.”

And regarding Roy’s: “It’s true, Jaws has been trivialized to death, but the image can still be both evocative and memorable. So it is with the rat that ate the bananas in Chang’s strong editorial cartoon. You can bet the cartoon will not be thumb-tacked to the walls of any of the businesses in the marketplace. A clear winner.”

As MidWeek‘s editor, and as a guy who has loved good editorial cartoons going back to Herb Block when I was a kid, I’m very proud of Roy and Dick, as is all of our MidWeek ohana.

And with the syndicated work of Steve Kelly, who has won national awards and whose work is frequently reprinted in Time and Newsweek among the best of the past week, our editorial cartoons bring readers diverse commentary just as our editorial columns do.

MidWeek brought home another Pa’i Award last week, in the best non-daily newspaper category - third place behind Honolulu Weekly (second) and Pacific Business News.

Judges said of MidWeek: “A massive multi-edition weekly that does it all - cover stories, columns, calendars, comics, Q-andA features ... it’s all here. Solid design, nice use of color. A fun community weekly that’s thorough and user-friendly.”

While we are gratified by the respect and recognition of fellow journalism professionals, quite frankly the judges who matter most to us are our readers - the half-million of you who every week pick up MidWeek and vote with your eyes and your page-turning fingers. It is each of you who make this the best-read publication in Hawaii. With our readership continuing to grow even in tough times, we are very grateful for each of you.

This year’s Pa’i Awards, I must say, were somewhat bittersweet. The level of talent and professionalism in Hawaii journalism on display - the top three in each category were projected onto a big screen - was phenomenal. Great writing, great photography and great page design were evident everywhere. I’m proud to be associated with - and to compete against - people who care so much about doing good journalism. That’s the sweet part. The bitter is that everyone knew that next year at this time there could be just one daily newspaper in Our Town, and some folks there could be out jobs.

Whatever shakes out, you can be sure that all of us at MidWeek will continue to strive to be Hawaii’s best paper.

I was also proud of our cousins at the Star-Bulletin, who won a ton of awards.

In particular, congrats to Dave Reardon, S-B sports columnist, who took third place in the editorial column category, open to columnists of all types (based on three columns submitted to judges).

In typical Dave style, he brushed off any praise: “All it means is, I had three good days last year.”

Ol’ droll Dave is good at understatement too.

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Michener’s Afghanistan Lessons

Just finished reading James Michener’s novel Caravans, and both my immediate and lingering impression is that it is a book every American who goes to Afghanistan would do well to read, whether soldier, diplomat or NGO worker. Likewise for anyone who has any voice in creating American policy there, starting with the president and congressional leaders of both parties.

Originally published in 1963 and set in 1946 following the end of World War II, Caravans is written in the first person, in the voice of a young American diplomat at the U.S. embassy in Kabul. His work, adventurous spirit and growing affection for the country and its people take him on a journey criss-crossing rivers, deserts and mountains. Foreshadowing future wars, the Soviets (Russia), English and Americans have a foothold in Afghanistan.

 

Page after page, I had one recurring thought: Almost nothing has changed since 1946! Then as now, modern, often Western-educated Afghans attempting to build a functional government that provides security, clean water, roads and jobs are in a constant battle against the medieval influences of imams with a strict Sharia law view of Islam. Then as now, Afghanistan is largely caught in the Iron Age, with tribal loyalties outweighing national interests. Then as now, there is great pressure on women to live beneath a chador, the full-body gown that covers the face. Then as now, there is a great mistrust of foreigners - which may have something to do with having a million people slaughtered just by Genghis Khan, among other invaders who swept through from one direction or another.

Without commenting on U.S. policy and strategies in Afghanistan, I will say that most of the Americans and British in Michener’s tale seem as clueless about this harsh land, its people and its history as the current Americans there I read about in the news magazines. And like the protagonist, that young diplomat, I wonder if any war there is winnable in any way that we normally associate with victory - short of the Genghis Khan approach.

Caravans is Michener at his best, mixing stellar historical research and remarkable personal travels throughout the country, while creating a captivating plot and characters you care about.

It does not end in a way I had hoped. Instead, it ends in the only way it could.

Another Michener book has been on my mind for, oh, the past year and a half or so: Poland. It is, in fact, the story of Europe and how it developed from primitive societies to modern times.

A recurrent theme is how little the ruling families and dynasties that warred for power on the continent cared for the people they ruled, and how personal interest repeatedly trumped national loyalties, even national borders.

In fact, it reminds me very much of current U.S. politics, especially in Washington, as well as the attitude of Wall Street bankers - only personal interest, profit and power matter, not the health and welfare of the nation and its people. Instead, it’s all about getting yours while the getting is good, and to hell with the serfs and peons who do all the productive work.

I highly recommend both books.

Mr. Michener, by the way, appeared on MidWeek‘s cover in January 1986. Our columnist Dan Boylan, a historian, didn’t write that one, but did visit Michener in the early 1980s while he was working on Texas. Recalls Dan: “I was researching a book on Gov. Burns. Michener had an office at the University of Texas in Austin, and I was visiting the LBJ Presidential Library there to read files on Hawaii state-hood. He granted me an interview over lunch at a cafeteria near the UT campus. He was very gracious and talked with total recall about his time in Hawaii in the late ‘50s. A lifelong Democrat, he was particularly interested in the formation of the post-war Democratic Party in Hawaii and the first statehood election. His novel Hawaii contained a composite character based on Burns and labor leader Jack Hall.

“Michener did voluminous research for his novels, and while historians have been heard to fault his knowledge of history, Michener did label them historical fiction. And, in my opinion, they were historical fiction of a very high order.”

Talk about brazen. Just when you think you’ve heard it all - especially after MidWeek‘s Most Wanted cover story that focused on scams, forgery and identity theft - the FBI’s Honolulu office has sent out an alert warning about “fraudulent e-mails coming into Hawaii that purport to be originating from the FBI. These e-mails often seek personal information or payments from unsuspecting recipients.The fraudulent e-mails give the appearance of legitimacy through the usage of pictures of the FBI Director, seal, letterhead and/or banners. Schemes utilizing the FBI name are typically notifications of cash prizes or inheritance proceeds that do not exist. Other e-mails purport to be the FBI levying fines via e-mail.”

“This a practice that does not exist in reality,” says FBI special-agent-in-charge Char-lene Thornton (another recent MidWeek cover subject). “The FBI does not send out e-mails soliciting personal information from citizens.”

By the way, thanks to tips from alert MidWeek readers, nine of the 12 criminals on our Feb. 3 cover had been apprehended as of last Friday. Good work, folks!

 

Finally, a salute to Gen.

Fred Weyand who died Feb. 10 at age 93. I was honored to write his MidWeek cover story in July 1997, and honored more that while he chose never to write a book, he shared so much of his remarkable career with me.

As I told his daughters last week, I was never in the military, but would have followed Gen. Weyand into any battle. Active in our community to the end, this old soldier did not just fade away. Aloha, sir.

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Speaking Frankly With Mayor Fasi

As MidWeek political guru Dan Boylan writes on page 10, everybody has a Frank Fasi story, and some of us have several. This was my introduction to the late mayor, who passed away last week at age 89:

It was December 1979 at Ali’i Beach Park in Haleiwa, where a big professional surf contest was happening. I’d been at the Advertiser as daily columnist about a month and a half. Buck Buchwach, the editor who’d hired me, had mentioned during the job interview how Fasi hated the Hawaii Newspaper Agency and the joint operating agreement that allowed HNA to handle advertising, production and distribution of both the Advertiser and Star-Bulletin. In fact, Fasi often blamed “the media” for everything wrong in the world, or at least in Honolulu.

Anyway, we were in a roped off press area on the beach, and Fasi - a big camera buff - was asking my colleague Gregory Yamamoto about the long lens he was using that day. So I introduced myself:

“Hi, Mr. Mayor, I’m Don Chapman, the new columnist at the Advertiser, and even though I know you’ve had some differences with the paper, I wanted to get off to a fresh start with you personally.”

Shaking my hand, he looked me in the eye and said, ‘You sure work for a sh—-y newspaper!” and with a smirk on his face turned on his heel away from me.

Whereupon I said loud enough that he couldn’t miss it, “Geez, this guy is a bigger (10-letter compound cussword) than I’d heard he was!” Which made him do a double-take as he walked away.

Funny thing is, after that when I saw him he was relatively cordial. I suspect that he was accustomed to talking to people like that and getting away with it, and street fighter that he was, when someone threw it back at him and didn’t back down, he could respect that.

Speaking of Fasi and cameras: Talking with George F. Lee, Star-Bulletin photo editor, on the day after Fasi died, he recalled that while Fasi disdained reporters, he liked to hang out with the photogs, inspecting and inquiring about their equipment. “He loved us,” George said.

Probably no coincidence that Charles Fasi, his son, is a professional photographer.

Fasi also loved his dog Gino, a black-and-white spaniel. Gino was always good column fodder, especially when the carpet in the mayor’s office had to be replaced - twice, as I recall - because Gino did what dogs, uh, do.

Fasi twice appeared on MidWeek‘s cover, first as mayor in October 1984, just a few months after the paper started publishing, and again in May 1998 when he was running for governor. Nathalie Walker’s cover photo shows him doing push-ups - he’d do hundreds every day in his office and was in exceptional shape at age 77.

He was an odd man - playing dirty politics and slinging mud with the best of them, standing up for the little guy, double-crossing Gov. Ben Cayetano (according to Cayetano’s book), but doing many good things for Honolulu, including making TheBus one of the best transit systems in the U.S.

Frank Fasi left a mark on Our Town, and for all his faults and foibles I’d rate him as good a mayor as I’ve seen in my 30 years here.

We got some excellent news late Friday afternoon as we were putting MidWeek to bed: Thanks to tips from alert MidWeek readers, four of the 12 CrimeStoppers Most Wanted criminals on last week’s cover were caught: James Aiwohi, Roxanne Arzaga, Sheldon Pepee and Isaiah Kaisa.

Better yet, says HPD Sgt. Kim Buffett, CrimeStoppers coordinator, “Thanks to MidWeek readers, we have info on all but one of the others and hope that they will all be apprehended soon.”

And please check out our new CrimeStoppers Most Wanted feature on page 18, with two more criminals.

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A Nice Memento For Criminals

Hard to believe, but it’s been 15 years since MidWeek first published a CrimeStoppers’ Most Wanted Criminals cover story - quite shocking at the time for a publication known for publishing good news. Since then it’s been nearly an annual thing, and as mentioned in this week’s cover story (page 38) over the years MidWeek readers have helped take about 100 lawbreakers off the streets of Honolulu.

Congratulations and thank you!

This is, frankly, one of my favorite issues of the year. My good pal Rick Ornellas spent 25 years with HPD, and when we at MidWeek hear of yet another Most Wanted criminal captured and arrested, I get a sense of the satisfaction - and a bit of the rush - police officers find in their work.

 

We’ve also noted with a certain amusement that various other media outlets saw the attention MidWeek received when our Most Wanted were arrested, and in the truest form of flattery have given more coverage to CrimeStoppers’ bulletins. Hey, it’s all for a good cause, I say, so go for it.

Several readers over the years, most persistently the noted classical harpist Ruth Freedman, have suggested a weekly CrimeStoppers feature. Thanks to our president Dennis Francis, beginning next week we’ll introduce just such a feature. Which means that every week you’ll have the opportunity to be an active participant in fighting crime and making Our Town a safer place.

That said, we want to emphasize, as does HPD Sgt. Kim Buffett, CrimeStoppers coordinator, that you should never attempt to apprehend these fugitives from justice. Instead call the anonymous hotline (no caller ID and conversations are not recorded): 955-8300 or *CRIME on your cell phone.

You’ll be given a code number, and if your tip leads to a conviction, you’re eligible for a cash reward of up to $1,000. Although many citizens decline, happy just to be contributing to the greater good, over the years Honolulu CrimeStoppers has paid nearly $300,000 in rewards.

Other salient statistics: Overall, Honolulu CrimeStoppers tips have led to about 2,400 arrests, 6,000 cases cleared, $4.5 million in property recovered, nearly $2 million in drugs seized, and more than $6 million in cash recovered.

CrimeStoppers, by the way, is a nonprofit that receives no government funding, other than the city paying the salaries of HPD officers assigned to CrimeStoppers. Like most nonprofits, monetary donations and volunteers are always needed. For more information, go to www.crimestoppers-honolulu.org.

Serious as this endeavor is, it has not been without a few amusing moments.

Such as that first year, 1995, when a regular MidWeek reader went out to her mailbox to get the latest issue and was shocked to see herself on the cover among the Most Wanted. She immediately called me and demanded, “Who gave you permission to use my picture?!”

“Uh, HPD,” I replied. “By the way, ma’am, where are you calling from?”

She turned herself in a couple of days later. Then there was the letter that arrived a couple of years ago from OCCC - marked with a red stamp indicating that prison personnel had reviewed the letter before it was mailed. The incarcerated writer asked if it was possible to obtain a copy of a past Most Wanted cover. He wanted it as a keepsake, he said, because not only had he appeared on that cover, but so had his girlfriend, and it would mean a lot for them to have their moment of fame framed.

Honestly, you can’t make this stuff up. We at MidWeek value our relationship with CrimeStoppers and HPD, and with your help look forward to assisting them in their very important work.

Not to mention creating new mementos for other criminals.

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Fireworks, Tiger, Painful Pineapple

Ah, tradition - or, do you hear what I hear?: A friend in Tokyo was shocked when I described in an e-mail about Honolulu fireworks on New Year’s Eve - bombs rattling windows, the sky filled with colorful explosions, smoke so thick it was tough to see houses a block away. Things could not be more different there: “Tokyo is very quiet, almost silent, a time for reflection, and we strain to hear the temple bell ringing.”

To do so is considered a blessing ... And to the schmuck who blew off a bone-rattling bomb a block or so away as I was about to hit a shot at Bayview golf course at about 8:30 a.m. on Jan. 1: Dude, if I knew where you lived, I just might have been teeing off at your house ...

 

Speaking of golf: I certainly was not thinking about Tiger Woods and his alleged dependence on the sleeping drug Ambien as I watched the DVD Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man, about one of my generation’s great songwriters. But then came this lyric: “If you take sleeping pills / you will end up in the company of unhappy women.” ...

So, one more year we won’t be seeing Tiger at the Sony Open, eh ...

Here’s one of my favorite Sony Open stories, although this one goes back to when it was called the United Airlines Hawaiian Open. It was told to me a few years ago at Kapalua by golfer-broadcaster Gary McCord, and happened in the early 1970s.

Like many pros playing in their first Hawaiian Open in those days, Kermit Zarley was astounded by the pineapples used as tee markers on each hole, the young Texan never having before seen one. “It’s a pineapple,” a veteran pro explained. “It’s a fruit, you eat it.”

The next day, Zarley showed up for his round at Waialae CC with cuts and scratches all over his lips and chin. As McCord tells it, “Kermit went out and bought a pineapple at a grocery store, took it back to his hotel room and tried to eat it - like an apple - without cutting it open! And he didn’t give up right away, either.” ...

Otherwise: Voting by mail-in ballot worked well in choosing a replacement for the late Windward City Councilwoman Barbara Marshall. And Oregon uses mail-ins exclusively. While I personally like stepping into a voting booth, and seeing other citizens coming out to exercise their most basic American right, why not use mail-in ballots to choose a replacement in Congress for Neil Abercrombie after he resigns Feb. 28? Shouldn’t be that tough, as the 1st Congressional District is mostly urban Oahu, although as our political guru Dan Boylan says, “It’s creeped out in recent years to include some of Leeward Oahu.” ...

The new decade got off to a good start in my world with news that MidWeek read-ership is up another 2 percent. May not seem like much, but that’s 2 percent of 500,000. (Nice to see that readership of our sister publication the Star-Bulletin is also up.)

I believe one of the reasons more people are turning to MidWeek is they appreciate our dedication to presenting multiple voices and multiple points of view. A great example this week is the very different takes Bob Jones and Jerry Coffee give to their Vietnam experiences (pages 8 and 10). Bob tends to be liberal, Jerry conservative. Different as they and their experiences are, there is obvious respect between the two men. I’m proud as heck to be their editor.

Thank you to one and all who reach for our paper each week, and to all those on our team who work so diligently to produce and deliver Hawaii’s best-read publication. In MidWeek, it will be a very good year ...

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The High Priests Wore Board Shorts

Medical evidence suggests sitting on the beach watching waves breaking on the shore lowers your blood pressure. Such has been my experience.

But such was absolutely not the case last Tuesday at Waimea Bay when The Eddie went off for the first time in five years.

Formally known by a commercial mouthful so ponderous it seems to need punctuation - The Quiksilver in Memory of Eddie Aikau Fueled by Monster Energy (whew!), named in honor of the late, heroic Waimea lifeguard - The Eddie happens at the bay only when wave heights reach a minimum 25 feet. The occurrence of big and clean is so rare, this was just the eighth time in 25 years contest organizers called it “on,” and the first since 2004.

Yers truly had to be there. Midway through the contest, beach announcer Kaipo Guerrero - surveying 20,000 to 30,000 people lined 20-deep on the beach and clinging to rocky cliffs on either side of the bay like so many ‘a’ama crabs - asked, “Don’t any of you people have to work today?” Sitting in the shade of a hau tree, notebook in hand, I thought, “Dude, I am working.”

 

Of all the displays of nature’s power I’ve experienced that make a person feel puny upon this Earth - volcanic eruptions, hurricanes, earthquakes, typhoons, blizzards, rains of Biblical proportions and historic floods, house-shaking thunder and lightning, eclipses of the sun - there is nothing quite like massive waves. So big that the first thing you notice is the sound of the ocean, rumbling like thunder, exploding like live-fire ordnance, even the remnants of a barreling shore break creating such compression it reverberates through your bones, sinew and tissue.

The raw power of the sea on such days is a heart-pumper even if it’s limited to just waves - water incited and agitated by faraway storms and winds - that make you gasp in awe.

And then, on the day The Eddie goes, tiny little men on tinier little boards made of foam and resin and decals and hope jump into the ocean and paddle out 500 to 600 yards through freight train after freight train of onrushing walls of water, all for the right to essentially jump off a five-story building with a surfboard. Sorry, Doc, no lowered blood pressure here, just good, edgy excitement churning the innards.

Waves were so huge Tuesday, spectators standing at the top of Waimea’s severely canted beach, 15 feet above the waterline, were sometimes unable to see surfers taking off on waves because their vision was blocked by a preceding wave. Even from the judges’ tower another 20 feet up, contestants were occasionally blocked from view by waves in front.

On a day like this, with both nature and humans showing off, adrenaline hangs in the air like the salty mist kicked up by the constant explosions of sea crashing upon sea, sand and lava rock.

And surfboards. I lost track, but at least six or seven boards were broken during this year’s running of The Eddie - four just in the third hour-long heat of the day, two of those coming undone beneath the feet of Garrett McNamara. (Fortunately, board “caddies” on Jet Ski sleds rushed replacement boards to surfers who broke one.) And these are not your usual surfboards. They’re longer, thicker, heavier. Halves of one red board hauled ashore were about 4 inches thick. Kelly Slater, the nine-time world champ who finished second at Waimea this time (and won in 2002), has a board he uses only in The Eddie.

Then there was 1990 champ Keone Downing, who wiped out, lost his leash, he said, “and my eyes - my contact lenses got knocked out.”

Packed and ready, I’d left my Kaneohe home seven minutes after the call was made that The Eddie was on. Kaneohe Bay was placid as a pond, but driving up the east side of Oahu - through Kaaawa, Punaluu, Hauula, Laie, Kahuku - the sea grew increasingly turbulent. Here and there were wet patches where an hour or so earlier at high tide waves had thrown sand and pebbles onto Kamehameha Highway.

Turning the corner at Turtle Bay, the North Shore was catching a full frontal assault, and the turquoise sea roiled and frothed, waves crashing in towering white explosions like oceanic geysers.

Finding a parking place at Shark’s Cove - and a legal one, luckily, because HPD officers were going through parking ticket pads the way Garrett McNamara was going through surf-boards - I walked across to Foodland-Pupukea to grab a sandwich (an employee was filling a cooler case with cartons and cartons of fresh sandwiches just trucked in for the expected crush) and a back-up pen (told you I was working). The woman at the checkout counter shook her head and laughed the laugh of a woman who is not really amused when I said, “Kind of busy today, eh?”

“Busy?” she replied, blowing bangs off her forehead. “We’ve never had anything like this!”

Outside, throngs of people on foot and on bikes - I didn’t realize that many cruiser bikes existed on the entire planet! - made their way along the bike path toward Waimea, ecstatic pilgrims in sandals on their way to the mecca of surfing, passing cars that inched along the road bumper to bumper, called ever onward by the throaty roar of the sea and of early arriving spectators. In ancient times, Waimea was such a sacred place to Hawaiians it was known as The Valley of the Priests of Priests. On this day, the high priests wore board shorts.

The beach was a patchwork of towels and blankets and mats and lava-lavas arrayed across the sand, hem to hem, with no exit aisles. (Spectators may have set some sort of record for saying, “Uh, excuse me,” light-stepping as if through a maze to get to a lua or find a friend.)

And the beach scene was buzzing with a positive vibe, as if everyone there was grateful to be experiencing such a glorious day at the beach, such epic surf and such ridiculous displays of courage and cojones.

But there was also an undercurrent of menace - these guys were literally risking their lives. Prayers were whispered.

Fortunately, there were no serious injuries, although the day before, with waves huge but sloppy, former two-time world champ Tom Carroll of Australia broke an ankle in a wipeout, which left his foot “flopping around” at the end of his leg. Talk about a goofy footer. The worst injury Tuesday seemed to be to Brock Little’s elbow. Coming down a sheer face, the nose of his board pearled (dug into the water), slowing him, and the wave “ran me over,” he said, knocking him to the bottom where his elbow banged a coral head and opened a cut. That may be the most amazing aspect of the 2009 Eddie - 28 surfers, eight hours of surfing on raging monster waves, and the worst injury is a scraped elbow. High priests, indeed.

No, I take that back. The most amazing thing was seeing Clyde Aikau, Eddie’s kid brother by three years and the winner of the second Eddie, in 1986, out there in the lineup, still competing at age 60 and taking the drop down those treacherous faces. Clyde and I are, shall we say, contemporaries, and the graying dude finished ahead of relative youngsters Keone Downing, Michael Ho, Darryl “Flea” Virostko, Brian Keaulana, Rusty Keaulana and Pancho Sullivan. I have a new hero.

(Yes, head-jarring as it may sound, the “Eddie Would Go” icon, who was lost at sea in 1978 while paddling for help when the sailing canoe Hokulea was floundering in wild seas off Maui, would be 63.)

In the end, the winner’s check went to 26-year-old southern Californian Greg Long, a guy who lives out of his van so he can chase the biggest waves on a moment’s notice, and as a boy dreamed of surfing in The Eddie. On his first try, he got the win with a perfect 100-point ride in the last heat to overtake Slater, on a 50-footer, the biggest wave of the day.

It was a wave, said Sunny Garcia, who took third place, “I didn’t want ... He’s crazy.”

Which of course he meant as a compliment.

Who knows when the next Eddie will happen. Twice the contest got the go in back-to-back years - 1985 and ‘86, 1999 and 2000 - but there was once a 10-year hiatus - 1990-‘99 -and then the just-ended five-year furlough. But whenever the call may go out for the next Eddie, I hope ol’ Clyde is in the lineup, and I’m on the beach to see it.

Until then, The Eddie of ‘09 will forever be a day not just to remember, but to savor. Because this is as fantastic as life in these Islands gets.

 

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BOE Members In It For The Dough

Where to start with what’s wrong with our public schools? How about a Board of Education where at least two members show up at their twice-monthly board meetings so they’ll be reported in the minutes as present - and thus collect their $100 stipend - and then often leave shortly thereafter. Or so one disgusted BOE member tells me. What a lousy way to make a hundred bucks ...

And why have less than half of public schools applied to convert teacher prep days to teaching days? Are there that many principals who are not paying attention? ...

Otherwise, sorry to hear radio legend Ron Jacob’s Kaneohe hillside home caught fire the other day. Started at a neighbor’s house and jumped to Ron’s place. Fortunately, his studio and extensive record collection were saved as firefighters got there just in time to extinguish the blaze before it could spread ...

Ran across a great quote from the late Rev. Paul Osumi, whose “Today’s Thought” was a popular newspaper feature for many years. Does this sound like anyone you know? And might it help explain our cultural mania for nonstop cell-phone talking, texting and tweeting, as well as playing video games and watching movies on small hand-held devices to fill every waking moment?

 

“Many people try to run away from their inner loneliness. They do not know how to be alone. They do anything to escape being alone. They are always on the go; they are always doing something. To live meaningfully, we must master one of the fine arts of life - learning how to be alone without being lonely.” ...

Just wondering: Why is it traditional to bestow the honorific “The Honorable” before a politician’s name - as in the Honorable Sen. Quid Pro Quo - when so many of them are clearly not very honorable? ...

My take on UH football head millionaire, er, coach Greg McMackin: The Warriors of 2009 have suffered too many injuries to too many key players, putting too many young men on the field who were a year or two away from being skilled enough to play significant minutes. It doesn’t matter how well they’re coached or how hard they try if the skill, knowledge and physical abilities are not there. Apart from the state being in no position to buy out McMackin’s contract, the guy deserves at least one more year. And those kids who are taking their lumps this year will hopefully come back in 2010 smarter, stronger and more skilled - and with big chips on their shoulders ...

Couple of significant anniversaries in my life recently: Oct. 29 marked 30 years since my first byline appeared in a Hawaii newspaper, and Nov. 7 marked 15 years since I became the editor of MidWeek. Time flies when you’re working with great people and editing Hawaii’s best-read paper. And, yes, I did celebrate the 11/7 date with a chilled beverage ...

And thank you to the United Filipino Council, which recently honored me with its annual Ating Kaibigan (Our Friend) Award - presented to a non-Filipino who has shown support for the Filipino Community in Hawaii. I’m grateful for the honor, and all the friendships ...

Recently finished former Gov. Ben Cayetano’s book Ben - a surprisingly good read - and it reminded me why I enjoyed interviewing him over the years. You might not agree with Ben, but he’s going to give you the straight scoop, no holds barred. And unlike many pols, he truly cared about “the little guy.” ...

Heck, you could even call him “The Honorable” and I wouldn’t argue ...

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Creating Hawaii’s Favorite Paper

I’ll begin this column in MidWeek‘s 25th anniversary issue with the same anecdote I shared in my first column as MidWeek‘s editor in November 1994.

You see, during the 20 previous years I spent as a reporter and columnist, my attitude toward editors was summed up by a veteran New York Times reporter at his retirement party after 40 years. Asked why he never became an editor, as if that were some sort of career deficiency, he legendarily replied: “Editors are those people who separate the wheat from the chaff, and throw away the wheat!”

Having had my brilliant copy hacked up too often by what I considered clumsy, insensitive, goose-stepping Nazi storm troopers posing as editors, I agreed completely.

And then I became one. Yikes.

As it turns out, in a career of what I consider to be nothing but plum jobs (some guys have all the luck), this is by far the best. I’ve heard that it’s not healthy to identify what you do with who you are, but it’s too late for that. I am the editor of MidWeek, and love everything about this job.

(What makes that funny is I hated MidWeek when it began publishing in July 1984. At the time I was the Advertiser‘s lead columnist, and the job came with six paid Neighbor Island trips annually, as well as a Mainland trip. Yes, sweet. But shortly after MidWeek first rolled off the press, my travel budget got whacked - because the little startup was luring away ads from local grocery chains. Even funnier: Today I’m pleased to say they remain a big part of what we do.)

Anyway, over the years I’ve tried to throw away only the chaff, and to cultivate the wheat. You’ll have to ask our writers how well I’ve succeeded. But it’s my humble opinion that

MidWeek is the best-written publication in town.

In the past 15 years, both MidWeek and its editor have undergone some changes (in my case, less hair, more pounds and kids all grown up). When I started, MidWeek had almost no journalistic credibility. It was rightly called a “shopper.” I was determined to change that.

Almost equally bothersome to me was the lack of organization within the pages. Politics, sports, entertainment and food columns were sort of jumbled throughout the paper. So the first thing I did was establish a sensible, predictable flow of content from front to back.

I also started lobbying for more color pages - at the time the only color was on the cover and in a few ads - much to the consternation of our late press manager Russ Retynski, one of the world’s all-time great grouches (but who is still greatly missed).

One story in particular started to change the way people looked at MidWeek - and who even bothered to pick it up. In January1995, for an interview that then-columnist Eddie Sherman helped arrange, Eddie, myself and photographer George F. Lee flew to the Big Island to sit down with Larry Mehau. I brought along four hours of blank tapes, normally more than enough, but we ended up spending the entire day with Larry and his wife Bev at their Waimea ranch, even staying for dinner. Larry and I met two more times at his Hawaii Protective Association office in Honolulu, for a total of 15 hours of interviews, which produced a two-part cover story - among other things debunking Rick Reed’s self-serving fable that Larry was the so-called “godfather” in Hawaii.

Similarly, retired Gen. Fred Weyand sat down for a series of interviews that produced another two-part cover story, in which he for the first time detailed a career that included service in World War II, Korea and Vietnam. I was, and am, honored that this great man shared his stories with me and MidWeek. (The general has so many good stories, I repeatedly urged him to write a book, but he always refused. He is man of honor.)

Perhaps nothing brought MidWeek as much attention in the early days as our Most Wanted covers, publishing photos and rap sheets of CrimeStoppers’ most-wanted criminals. With a capture rate of about eight of 10, even other media had to cover the captures and mention us. My favorite story regards the woman who appeared on that first Most Wanted cover. An avid MidWeek reader, she went out to her mailbox as usual on a Tuesday in September 1995 and was shocked to see herself. So she called me and demanded, “Who gave you permission to use my photo?!” My reply: “HPD. Uh, where are you calling from, ma’am?”

We also added new features, including Newsmaker, Old Friends, Good Neighbor and Movers.

Readers noticed the changes, and within one year of my assuming the editor’s desk MidWeek‘s readership for the first time surpassed that of the daily papers. Given my 13 years with the Advertiser as daily columnist, beating some of those storm trooper-editors tickled me quite a bit.

And a decade ago we moved to a more convenient tabloid format (from a double-foldout broadsheet, because we wanted a paper people could read on a bus without getting into a fight with their seatmate).

As our readership continued to grow, so did the paper itself - from 24-32 pages in 1994 to 80 or more today.

In the early years, I wrote most of those features, along with a column and some cover stories. But as our staff gradually increased from three full-timers in the office to 14 (with a similar increase in the number of local columnists and freelance contributors), in recent years I find myself writing less and managing more. In fact, working with younger writers, photographers and artists to help turn a raw idea into a polished story is every bit as satisfying to me as writing a solo story.

Also significantly, in the early days I judged MidWeek columnists to be too white, male and liberal. Nothing wrong with any of those - to paraphrase the old saw, hey, some of my best friends are liberal white males - but not when that describes nearly all your political writers. And so we began to find some balance by adding new columnists, including Rick Hamada and Michelle Malkin, ardent conservatives both, one of Japanese heritage, the other Filipino.

The single thing of which I am most proud is that you will never find a newspaper that presents a broader spectrum of opinion on matters of politics and world affairs than MidWeek. This represents my world view as perhaps the most independent editor you’ll ever meet. Which is why each week we publish columns with which I disagree, from both our liberal and conservative writers. To do anything less, to me, is to fail to fully express our sacred American liberty. At a point in history when press freedom is limited or nonexistent in so many parts of the world - Iran and Myanmar are perfect examples, China limits news about protests by Tibetans and Uigurs, and when President Obama gives a speech to the people of Russia it is not carried by state-controlled Russian TV or papers - MidWeek will remain a beacon of free expression, where all civil dialogue is welcome.

Indeed, nothing gives me more satisfaction than hearing from readers who say they appreciate MidWeek‘s obvious respect for their intelligence by offering multiple, undiluted opinions of all stripes.

And so, considering all this, by the time MidWeek was named best non-daily newspaper in the Hawaii Publisher’s Association Pa’i Awards a few years ago, nobody was surprised.

One of the best things to happen to MidWeek during my tenure was the promotion of Ron Nagasawa to publisher in December 2001. Ron tends to be a quiet guy, but when he speaks good ideas pour forth. Honolulu Pa’ina photo pages, Business Roundtable, the Hot Ticket movie review, Style pages, Scene@Night nightlife photos, Ron Mizutani’s ocean column and the pets column by Dr. John Kaya each originated with Ron - who also just happens to be our town’s most popular columnist. Among our staff, Ron is like the coach you want to play your best for and win, because you respect him so much and don’t want to disappoint him.

Likewise, our owner David Black bringing in Dennis Francis as company president in July 2004 infused us with new energy and good ideas, including the popular Doctor In The House column as just one example. In this business, we run on energy and ideas as your (non-hybrid) car runs on gasoline.

Two things about MidWeek have remained constant over the past 15 years:

First, senior editor Terri Hefner had been here nearly two years when I arrived, and she is one of the most solid, reliable and hardest-working people I have ever known. I respect her tremendously, and often bounce ideas off her. If Terri thinks an idea is bad, forget about it.

Second, readers appreciate that we do “good news.” Next time you hear someone say good news doesn’t sell, point ‘em our way. In fact, in the past year MidWeek readership is up by 20,000 adults, according to Scarborough Research, at a time when papers across the country are losing readers, from The New York Times to the Los AngelesTimes, and other papers are tanking, including big, venerable papers in Denver and Seattle. Even the San Francisco Chronicle is on the ropes, and its demise would leave the city without a daily paper. Meanwhile here on Oahu, half a million folks pick up MidWeek every week, and we thank each one of you for doing so.

But we’re not about to take anything for granted, not in these times. Yes, being the best-read newspaper in Hawaii does make us proud, especially looking back at whence we came. But it’s also a responsibility to every week bring you stories that are of continuing interest and relevance in your life - stories that inform, entertain and edify. And by story I mean the full package, words, photos and headlines.

At many papers there is a sort of disconnect between the editorial side and the advertising side. But you’ll never meet an editor who appreciates more than I what our sales folks do, and what our advertisers make possible - the delivery each week, for free, of an award-winning paper to nearly 300,000 Oahu homes, not to mention some fantastic savings when you shop. If you like receiving MidWeek, please continue to support the loyal advertisers who pay all the bills. (The amazing thing is our ad rates are considerably less expensive than, say, the Advertiser, which then charges people for the paper.)

As I’m fond of telling our staff, journalism is the greatest team sport ever. The process of turning raw story ideas into a printed newspaper that shows up in your mailbox requires so many steps and skill sets, so many people, only a great team can pull it off. And we’ve assembled a great team here at MidWeek.

I am eternally proud and grateful to serve as their editor, and look forward to celebrating future significant anniversaries with them and with you.

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Bucking A Trend With Good News

Although MidWeek is one of the rare newspapers in the U.S. to increase readership in the past year of economic doom and gloom - a total of nearly 500,000 readers, up (according to well-respected Scarborough Research) a whopping 20,000 adults, thank you very much - we’re not about to sit on our laurels. Not even as we prepare to celebrate our 25th anniversary next month. (Besides, I’ve heard laurels are not all that comfortable to sit on.)

So in the interest of continuing to give our readers fresh content, while also giving back to our community, with this issue we’re introducing a new feature, one that is uniquely MidWeek - which is already known for publishing “good news.”

It’s called Proof Positive. In conjunction with Clear Channel Radio (KSSK, etc.), every week we’re inviting an Island charitable organization to share its story, and the stories of people who have been helped.

This week it’s the Partners In Development Foundation, which focuses on “meeting today’s social, educational and environmental challenges through the application of Hawaii’s values and traditional practices.” It includes a great program that brings seniors to schools to interact with kids - something I believe is good for both kupuna and keiki, and for our whole community.

In addition, each week on the same page we’re offering free advertising space to another Hawaii nonprofit.

Also sharing space on the page is our popular Good Neighbor feature, which every week highlights exceptional volunteers in our town. Close by you’ll find Pamela Young’s Applause column, which salutes regular folks coming to the aid of total strangers in times of stress, and worse - it happens every day in Hawaii.

Good stories about good people doing good things and producing good results that’s Proof Positive, and you’ll find it only in MidWeek (page 41).

And I must say that in these days when papers from the New York Times to the L.A. Times are losing readers and money, with papers in Seattle and Denver shuttering after 150 years of publishing, and San Francisco on the verge of not having a daily paper, big kudos go to our president Dennis Francis and publisher Ron Nagasawa for essentially giving away valuable space for free in Hawaii’s best-read publication. As Dennis says, “Many nonprofit organizations are experiencing declines in contributions due to our faltering economy. This page will not only share good news stories, but will also allow nonprofits a chance to highlight their organization and tell readers how to make contributions.”

(Happily, and significantly, our cousins at the Star-Bulletin also showed remarkable growth over the past year, and that was even before they went to the handy tabloid format MidWeek readers know so well.)

You may have noticed that we also recently added a couple of other new features.

One is Dr. John Kaya’s On The Wild Side column, in which he shares humorous tails, er, tales from his veterinary practice, as well as practical pet tips (page 36).

On the same page is Pet Parade, where we invite readers to send us photos of them and their pets. Oh da cute!

And while he’s been cartooning for us for a few months now, I also want to mention that Dick Adair has brought his poignant pen to MidWeek. With Dick, Roy Chang and Steve Kelly, MidWeek editorial cartoons are second to none. Dick and I were colleagues many moons ago at the Advertiser, and I’ve always respected his work and hold him in high esteem as a person.

Speaking of talented contributors whom I hold in high personal regard: Congratulations to Uncle Tom Moffatt, who last week was nominated to the National Radio Hall of Fame. It’s a well-deserved and long-overdue honor, but it’s just a nomination. Public online voting is allowed, and you can vote for Tom at www.radiohof.org. If even half of MidWeek‘s readers vote for Uncle Tom, he’s a shoo-in.

Yup, we have lots of which to be proud here at MidWeek, including our readers. At a staff meeting last week, Yu Shing Ting and Nathalie Walker told of an incident while out doing a Mystery Shopper story in Wahiawa. As Ron Nagasawa says, it’s reflective of the times and the aloha spirit of MidWeek readers: When a woman answered Yu Shing’s question correctly and was told she’d just won a $250 shopping spree at Foodland, she waved it away and replied, “I’m doing OK. Give it to someone who can really use it.”

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The Joy And Perils Of A Foul Ball

I wasn’t going to mention in the pages of MidWeek that I recently caught a foul ball at a UH baseball game, but since Bob Hogue is spilling the beans in his column on page 70, well ...

And I’m not just bragging here - OK, maybe a little - there is a moral to this tale.

Setting the scene: It was a Saturday afternoon game against Loyola Marymount. Sitting in the first row of the upper section of seats behind first base, first inning of my first UH game of the season, fortunately I’d just put down my beer and hot dog when Rainbow third baseman Vinnie Catricala fouled off a screaming line drive - directly at me! If you were counting Mississippis, from the time it left his bat until it got to me was about one Mississi… Also fortunately, this old high school and college catcher had enough left in the way of reflexes to sort of smother the ball between my left thigh, forearm and right hand. It may have looked more like a soccer goalie making a save, but a catch it was, my first foul ball catch in a lifetime of attending ball games.

 

Woo-hoo!

I mention it here now only because UH baseball is again a hot ticket in town, and I’m frankly amazed that so many in attendance don’t seem to be paying attention, including kids running around the stadium, apparently without a thought about what could happen if a ball were ripped at them.

While catching a foul ball is the ultimate thrill for a lot of us fans, these batted projectiles can be dangerous and are potentially lethal. Not to sound like an old scold, but in the two games I’ve attended since that one, I’ve noted people sitting in that same seat, or walking up and down the stairs in front of it, entirely oblivious to the action on the field. Aball similar to the one I stopped could have caused an awful injury. If I’d been looking away at that moment, it might have cracked a rib. As it was, the ball left a pretty good bruise.

My healthy respect for these rock-like spheroids comes in part from having spent much of my youth as a human backstop, in part because the only player ever killed by a pitched ball in Major League Baseball was a guy named Ray Chapman, in the days before protective helmets. And a couple of years ago a minor league coach was killed by a foul ball. There’s a reason they call the game hardball. Which is why, back in the day when I was taking my two young keiki o ka aina to UH baseball games, I preferred sitting behind the protective screen. If that wasn’t possible, I at least sat between the kids and the batter, so I could intercept a foul ball before it hit them.

In short, the basic survival rule for fans, and the only way to catch a foul ball, is that if the batter is facing your side of the stadium, you should pay about as much attention as the defensive players on the field.

All that said, as Bob Hogue writes, I do like this UH team, a lot. Coach Mike Trapasso’s squad has talent throughout the lineup, plays good fundamental baseball, often comes up with spectacular defensive plays and timely hits, and always hustles. Most of all, they’re fun to watch play this great game. Oh, and they’re winning.

There’s nothing more relaxing to me than going out to a game, putting the feet up, having a couple of those tasty all-beef Eisenberg hot dogs and a tall, cold Gorden Biersch Marzen, and cheering the Bows.

This season, there’s lots to cheer about, and there’s a fresh buzz at the old (but beautifully refurbished) ball yard.

As they say, though, keep your head in the game and your eyes on the ball. It could be coming in a hurry to a seat near you.

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Behind The Scenes Of Obama Cover

‘08: Year of Obama

It was the last week of 2007 when I wrote that headline for the cover of our Jan. 2, 2008, issue, an intentional wordplay on the approaching Chinese New Year, Year of the Rat.

I tried other headline ideas, scribbling in a notepad, but kept returning to that one, even as part of my brain was screaming, “Idiot, Obama hasn’t won anything yet!”

So, yes, I knew MidWeek was taking a chance with such a bold prediction. But there was also another part of my brain, or gut, or something, maybe just an editor’s intuition, that made me go with ‘08: Year of Obama.

In light of last week’s stunning election, it’s looking pretty good.

The idea for MidWeek‘s first cartoon cover began with publisher Ron Nagasawa. In looking at photos with senior editor Terri Hefner, including several excellent shots we obtained from our cousins at the Star-Bulletin and from the Des Moines Register (Obama had been campaigning in Iowa leading up to the first caucuses), nothing was jumping out at us as a compelling cover shot.

That’s when Ron said, “Let’s ask Roy Chang to draw Obama.”

When I called our ace editorial cartoonist, he was immediately excited by the assignment. When, a few days later, Roy showed us the drawing of Obama with both Diamond Head and the White House, we too were excited, and pleased.

Creative director Gina Lambert completed the package by choosing a perfect font for the headline. And Dan Boylan’s cover story was insightful.

All of which further proves my belief that journalism is the world’s greatest team sport, and that the MidWeek team is as good as they come.

(Regular readers also will recall that, in the interest of fairness and balance, we would later publish a cover story on Sen. John McCain.)

Regardless of which candidate you favored, I was most pleased by the number of Americans who voted, and especially the enthusiasm shown by people in their 20s, my children’s generation. More than anything, that bodes well for the future of our American republic.

The headline I’d write for Obama in 2009:

The Year of Getting to Work

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A Rewarding Award Weekend

In Dallas to accept MidWeek‘s award from the American Cancer Society, I was reminded of how much Texas and Hawaii share in common.

Really.

Yes, there are obvious differences - Texas being the largest state by far in the “Lower 48” and Hawaii being one of the smallest states in land area. But beyond that, there are remarkable similarities.

For starters, Hawaii and Texas are the only two of our 50 states that were once independent nations.

No two other states can boast lively, homegrown music industries that write and sing about the glories and legends of their home states, both relying heavily on steel guitar.

And both states have local cuisines unique to them, each derived from rich multi-ethnic traditions, including smoked meats - we like teriyaki, they prefer thick, vinegar-based red-brown sauces.

 

And as in Hawaii, I was greeted each day with a rainbow of ethnic hues, something I’ve come to prefer (over monochrome faces) during 29 years in these Islands. The Dallas-Fort Worth “metroplex” is home to nearly 7 million people hailing from every corner of the world. The primary ethnic groups are Caucasians, Mexicans and African Americans, but as my taxi driver last Monday said en route to the DFW airport, “Dallas is like New York City - any kind of people you want, you can find here.” He is a native of Congo, but after 20 years in Dallas is a true Texan - knowledgeable and passionate about the Dallas Cowboys and University of Texas Longhorns football teams.

The bellman at the Crowne Plaza Dallas Market Center hotel who’d helped load my bags was from Bulgaria.

The cabbie who upon my arrival several days earlier drove me from the airport to the hotel, Abbas, was from Sudan.

He turned out to be one of two Muslims with whom I enjoyed very interesting conversations, both personal and theological, deep in the heart of the Bible Belt. (Confession: Before taking up the pen, as an undergrad I minored in theology and later spent two semesters in a seminary.)

The second was Shubar, an Iraq native, who was a shuttle van driver employed by the hotel. A Shia Muslim from Basra in southern Iraq, he’d fled the country as a teenager with his brother.

“Many people in my family were killed by Saddam,” he said. “My brother and I were told that if we stayed one more night, we would be dead.”

They ended up in a refugee camp in Saudi Arabia, before Shubar found his way to Dallas a decade ago.

Although he would like to be home in Iraq, he is busy working on the American dream. Stylishly dressed in slacks, dress shirt and necktie, Shubar drives the hotel shuttle van from 2 to 10 p.m., answering his cell phone with a hip, “Hey, what’s happening, man?” Then he goes to work as an overnight delivery driver for a bakery. In his free time, he buys old cars, fixes them up and sells them.

Four years ago, after the Sunni dictator Saddam Hussein’s capture, he and his brother returned to Iraq for the first time since they fled.

“It was wonderful,” Shubar says. “Every day for three months it was like a party. Everyone wanted to cook dinner for us. I had to ask my mother, ‘Where should we go today?’”

While there, he met an attractive young woman, and they were married.

“She is a good Muslim, so of course she was a virgin,” Shubar said. “But on our wedding night, we made a baby.”

That child, a girl, is now 3. His son is 1. He showed me photos, and they are both beautiful little cherubs. “They are my heart,” he said.

When he learned my mother was at that moment in a hospital and not doing well, he offered to pray to Allah for her, and later reported that he had. “The Koran teaches,” he said, tapping his chest above his heart, “that God is above all, and second below God is your mother. You must never say anything bad or angry to your mother.”

The last time I saw Shubar we embraced, and he gave me a string of Muslim prayer beads, a cherished gift.

So when, back home again, I heard on the TV news another ignoramus say she could not vote for Barack Obama because he “might be a Muslim,” I had to say (this election season has me talking to the TV way more than usual): “He’s not, he was baptized a Christian, as an adult, but so freakin’ what if he were Muslim?”

The Muslims I have known, including Shubar, have been among the most decent people I’ve met. (They in fact remind me of my Mormon friends in their upright morality, dedication to family and charity in helping less fortunate members of their community.)

Yes, as both Shubar and the cabbie Abbas said, there are Muslims who take Allah’s name in vain by killing in his name. “They are wrong,” Abbas said, fingering the Koran he keeps on his dashboard. “They do not please God.”

I was certainly pleased, and blessed, to meet Abbas and especially Shubar.

 

As for that award - for a MidWeek cover story about seven women who beat breast cancer, written by Alice Keesing with photographs by Nathalie Walker - it was gratifying to hear fellow award winners from the Dallas Morning News, Daily Oklahoman, Omaha World-Herald, Lincoln Journal Star and others rave about our story and cover photo (copies of the the newspaper winners were posted on a big bulletin board at the awards luncheon.) In fact, I was told that in the weekly newspaper category, judges gave MidWeek‘s story scores of 10, except one who rated it a 9. A Cancer Society official told me, “There were a lot of good entries in the weekly category, but you were so far in front there was no second place.” (See Hot Shots on page 20 for a photo from the awards luncheon. In addition to print media, awards also were given to radio and TV reporters.)

In accepting the award, I commented that the response to our story came from women with breast cancer as well as their families, who called and e-mailed that the story gave them renewed hope, and in my experience there may be no more powerful ally in fighting cancer than hope.

I hadn’t planned on saying this, but in closing - and being so proud to be among so many good journalists - another thought hit me:

“I’m looking forward to this election being done as much as anything because I’m so tired of hearing the media criticized. If anyone says anything negative to you about the media ...” - and here I paused and pointed to the bulletin board covered with well-crafted and inspirational stories about courage, human resiliency, faith and hope - “... tell them this is what we do.”

I noticed then another award winner in the audience, a woman who twice beat breast cancer, applauding with tears in her eyes.

 

And not to get all preachy on you, but ... That pro-rail “Eddie Would Ride” bumper sticker is an absolute sacrilege. It’s dishonest, and dishonors the life and memory of Eddie Aikau.

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Savings In MidWeek,Nice Awards

When times get tough, as they most assuredly are, the tough turn to MidWeek.

And the wise.

Throughout the pages of MidWeek you’ll find great savings from our advertisers. In particular, grocery inserts from Times, Star, Foodland and Safeway point you to the best deals on everyone’s most basic necessity, food.

Likewise, restaurants are offering some terrific deals. You’ll find those on pages 65 through 68.

And there are more savings throughout the publication.

As the editor, my primary focus is on editorial content, but it is our advertisers who pay the bills and make it possible for 268,000 Oahu homes to receive MidWeek free of charge twice a week.

While we hope you’ll support the advertisers who make that possible, as a guy worried about his own 401K and other investments, I want to encourage you to take advantage of the savings our advertisers offer every week.

Combined with the broadest spectrum of opinion you’ll find in any American newspaper, plus entertaining and informative features and photos about local people and events, the savings available through our advertisers makes MidWeek unique, and quite a value.

And that’s some good news for you.

* I’m no economist, but it seems to me that while everyone I know is into saving money, if I spend some money at Business A, the people who work there benefit and have money to spend at Business B, and people at that establishment have money to spend with my company, on and on.

Call it the economic circle of life.

* You may recall the cover story we did in October of last year on seven breast cancer survivors, one in her 20s, as well as women in their 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s and even 80s, titled “Sisterhood of Survivors.”

During the summer we entered it in a journalism contest sponsored by the American Cancer Society, and just received notice that we won first place in the large market feature story category.

Kudos go especially to writer Alice Keesing, photographer Nathalie Walker and page designer Gina Lambert for putting together a compelling package of words and images.

By the way, and I’ll ask why when I accept the award at a luncheon in Dallas in coming days, Hawaii was grouped in the ACS’ High Plains Region with Nebraska, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas.

Whatever the reason, there are some excellent big city newspapers in those states, so we’re all the more proud of this latest award for our trophy case.

* Speaking of awards:

MidWeek and our cousins at the Star-Bulletin were involved in judging an essay contest - on the most inspirational woman in the writer’s life - for the recent fifth annual International Women’s Leadership Conference, hosted by Gov. Linda Lingle. Five MidWeek female journalists read the essays and were deeply touched by many of them. In the end, Melissa Pavlicek was named the winner for an essay on her mother-in-law Eloise Teves’ selfless devotion to her family.

It was quite appropriate, because after attending an earlier conference Melissa was inspired to start her own business, Hawaii Public Policy.

The conference was very impressive, bringing in accomplished women to share their stories, including the chief of police in Washington D.C., the first African-American woman Marine Corps jet fighter pilot, a woman CEO in the aerospace industry and a female Army general.

It’s an event with which we are proud to be affiliated, and are already looking forward to reading some more essays and being inspired again next year.

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Ben’s Book, Great Quotes, Etc.

I had a chance to chat with former Gov. Ben Cayetano recently when my son and his grandson graduated from the Honolulu Fire Department academy in the same class. Among other things, I asked about the memoir he’s writing.

“I’ll tell you this,” he replied, “if I ever write another book, it’s not going to be non-fiction. With non-fiction, you have to check and check and check to get your facts straight.”

“Welcome to my world, Governor,” I said.

“I mean it, if I ever write another book, it’s going to be fiction - you can just make stuff up.”

I mentioned this conversation to MidWeek political columnist Dan Boylan, who said he’d heard from a number of Ben’s former associates who’ve received late-night calls from him, asking for their recollection of specific details.

The manuscript is currently with the publisher, the governor says, and he expects to do some revisions before it goes to press.

Ben was certainly our most tell-it-like-it-is governor, and I’m looking forward to reading his book. * Got a kick out of meeting new UH football coach Greg McMackin when I was invited as a guest to hear him speak to the Pearl Harbor Rotary. With his warm, outgoing demeanor, in public he’s the anti-June Jones. And I liked this honest assesment:

“I’m still in the honeymoon phase. People are always coming up, shaking my hand, saying nice things. Of course, I haven’t lost a game yet.”

I also liked that he’s told his players to get physically fit enough to perform in the searing heat and humidity of an August afternoon in Gainesville, in the season opener against the tough Florida Gators:

“I told ‘em there will be no leaning over with your hands on your knees when you get gassed. Do that and you’re coming out of the game. We will not show any sign of weakness.” * Master sommelier Roberto Viernes’ recent MidWeek column on great wine quotes reminded me of this one from the late, great Robert Mondavi, spoken at the Kapalua Food & Wine Festival circa 1988: “Just because I like a wine doesn’t make it a good wine. What makes it a good wine is if you like it.” * Speaking of quotes: This is from a San Francisco Chronicle online columnist known as The Betting Fool, regarding Michelle Wie’s disqualification from a tournament for failing to sign her scorecard:

“How do you forget to sign a scorecard? Good Lord, it’s a wonder she can remember her phone number. How in the hell did she get into Stanford? ... Have you ever listened to a Michelle Wie press conference? You can practically hear the air rushing through her head as she talks.”

Ouch.

* I will say this: Michelle’s decision to pass up playing in an LPGA “major” - the Women’s British Open last week - in favor of playing what amounts to an exhibition against second-tier male pros in Reno is a head-scratcher. So she proved again she can’t make the cut against men. She needs to prove she can beat the women. If she can.

* I was sorry to hear of the recent death of Rocky Aoki, the colorful Benihana founder and adventurer. Back in September 1979, a month before I would move to Hawaii to begin work as a daily columnist at the Advertiser, I was the outdoor columnist at the San Jose Mercury News and was supposed to accompany Rocky on a test run out of the Golden Gate in a 38-foot offshore racing boat, on the day before a big ocean race. But at the last minute my editor decreed he wanted me in the office writing headlines instead. I was not pleased, to put it mildly. But it turned out to be a lucky thing. Racing at 70 mph, the boat hit a huge wave and disintegrated. Rocky suffered a ruptured aorta, a lacerated liver and a leg broken in four places. When I heard the news, I kind of felt better about that editor.

Condolences to his family, including his son Kevin Aoki, who runs the excellent Doraku Sushi at the Royal Hawaiian Center.

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The Education Of A Firefighter

Little did I know when my son Kai began training as a Honolulu Fire Department recruit in March that I would be receiving an education myself. But by the time he graduated on July 18 with 20 others in HFD’s 93rd recruit class, having lived vicariously through his four and a half months of training, I had a greater understanding and even more respect for our firefighters and what they bravely yet routinely do.

Which seems to be just about everything and anything.

Once he began training, seemingly every day on the news I noticed firefighters rescuing people from flaming buildings, sink holes, crane collapses, car accidents, home medical emergencies, chemical spills, natural disasters, and boating, swimming and hiking incidents. One of the senior officers who spoke at the graduation ceremony said that he’d participated in some of Class 93’s training because firefighters today are expected to learn and do so much more than they were just a few years ago - including experiencing a “flashover,” when heat from a fire builds up to 1,200 to 1,500 degrees and in an instant combusts everything in the room.

Yes, I’m writing as Kai’s very proud Pops, but also as a huge admirer of the men and women in those yellow trucks and fire-retardant uniforms. These people are truly elite, in the very best sense of the term. To put it in perspective: 5,000 people requested applications for the last HFD test, 4,000 people submitted applications, just 600 passed the test. From there, a grueling physical test and personal interviews narrowed the field, and Kai and his classmates were among the top 88 chosen. Happily, his brother Daniel Andrade begins training next month in HFD recruit Class 94, following their older brother James Andrade, a seven-year veteran, into the department. Class No. 94 will be the final group of 22 chosen from that last testing phase.

But that’s just the start of testing.

Kai and his classmates - who include the grandsons of former Gov. Ben Cayetano and legendary coach Al Minn - were tested on an almost daily basis, both academics and physical skills.

And they were allowed to fail just three tests, with one more opportunity, on the spot, to retake and pass the test. Fail that - or your fourth test overall - and you’re gone. So the pressure was on every day. As I commented after the graduation ceremony to lead training officer Captain Guy Katayama, Kai studied harder at the HFD academy than he did at Kamehameha or HPU. “They have to,” he replied. “It’s pretty intense.”

Kai’s training began with him and his classmates learning how to quickly put on their “turnouts” - protective boots, pants, jacket, gloves, helmet/mask and air supply - not as simple as it sounds to protect every inch of skin and seal out smoke, ash and water.

From there it was everything from learning how to use the various ladders, implements and hoses, using the “Jaws of Life” to cut open a car and doing traffic control, learning to tie all kinds of rope knots, passing national EMT certification (he did a stint doing “vitals” in the St. Francis West ER), two weeks of hazardous materials training, and lots of physical conditioning. Hearing about his first house fire and being “on the nozzle” brought home the reality - especially for me - of the career he was embracing. So too did his being on the nozzle for a training fire at the Chevron refinery, where he found himself almost knee-deep in a mixture of oil and water that began to burn. Unable to move the spray of water off the much bigger fire, they were trained to simply kick the floating flames to the side. He honestly seemed to enjoy that day as much as jumping out of a helicopter into the ocean at Sandy Beach, practicing ocean rescues.

Then there was learning triage for mass casualties - doing quick tests to decide who needs immediate medical care, whose injuries can wait and who is too badly injured to be saved. One of the firefighters who was first on the scene at the awful Sacred Falls rock fall spoke to the class about the emotional difficulty of identifying a woman who’d suffered massive internal injuries and for whom nothing could be done to save her. It hit me then that in his job Kai would be seeing things that I’d never wanted him to see as a little boy. “I know, Dad,” he said, “but people need us.”

Indeed, they - we - do. As Kai’s training progressed, I was increasingly impressed with the thorough preparation he and his classmates were receiving - first in the classroom, then outside to do it physically - as well as the discipline and camaraderie. When I think of the dangers he could face on any given day, that training makes me feel better.

Yes, as Kai goes to work at Engine Company 33 in Palolo Valley, I am indeed a very proud father. But each of us on Oahu can be proud of, and daily thankful for, all the men and women of the Honolulu Fire Department.

To each of you fire folks, thanks, God bless and stay safe.

 

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‘Most Wanted’ Are Now Behind Bars

Way to go, MidWeek readers! Thanks to you, the Honolulu Police Department and CrimeStoppers have accomplished a 100 percent arrest rate for the 10 Most Wanted criminals who appeared on our May 28 cover.

For the record, one of the 10, Moesolo Tuiloma, had died in prison but paperwork didn’t reach CrimeStoppers by the time we went to press, and the warrant for Mellisa Magbitang was subsequently recalled.

So we’re batting a solid eight for eight in ‘08.

In case you missed it, this year’s Most Wanted class were all involved in crystal methamphetamine - ice - in some way. As we said in the story, this is where ice leads, “first to a really crummy life and then to prison.” The case of Tuiloma - dying in prison - says it all. If there is a sadder, more pathetic way to die, what would it be?

By the way, since we began doing Most Wanted cover stories in 1995, we’re averaging about nine out of 10 captured. Yes, this is the one MidWeek cover on which nobody wants to appear - thanks to our readers.

As it turned out, I was attending the annual CrimeStoppers awards luncheon last Wednesday when CrimeStoppers coordinator Sgt. Kim Buffet shared the news that all of the fugitives were accounted for. It was a great feeling to have police officers, including Chief Boisse Correa, walk up and shake my hand and say thanks for what MidWeek does for our community.

The thanks here goes entirely to you, our readers. We work with CrimeStoppers to publish the story and photographs, but readers make the calls. Sgt. Buffet says that calls started coming in to CrimeStoppers immediately after the story was published, and that they received 35 tips that led to the arrest of the eight criminals by HPD officers.

Also of interest: At the luncheon Sgt. Buffet reported that in 2007 CrimeStoppers handled 968 tips that led to the arrest or case-closing of 268 criminals, and paid out more than $13,000 in rewards for anonymous tips that led to arrests. For the Student CrimeStoppers program, 85 tips led to 26 school actions and 64 arrests.

Kudos, too, to Ramsay Wharton of KGMB-TV, who also received an award at the luncheon. About half of her “Wanted Wednesday” criminals have ended up behind bars.

It’s a tough world out there, and CrimeStoppers does an outstanding job of removing criminals from our midst. All of us at MidWeek are proud to be associated with such an outstanding organization. In fact, each time we heard of an arrest of one of the Most Wanted, there were fist pumps in the office worthy of Tiger Woods.

Go ahead, MidWeek readers, give it a fist pump, too.

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D.K. And The Mad Sushi Scientists

After a sneak preview of the new sushi dishes that D.K. Kodama is introducing to his Sansei menu this week - which I’ll take over a sneak preview of Indiana Jones or the new line of cars from Detroit any day - I was reminded of Jack Nicklaus’ comment after watching Tiger Woods play golf for the first time: “He’s playing a game with which I am unfamiliar.”

Because as much time as I have spent in sushi bars over the years, I’ve never encountered anything quite like this.

Sure, D.K. and others have previously rolled out, so to speak, “Spider Rolls,” for example, but those still use traditional ingredients. Likewise for California rolls, Texas rolls and Philly rolls - variations on a theme that is centuries old.

But now D.K. is taking raw fish, fresh local produce and amazing sauces to create entirely new kinds of tastes.

“D.K. and the guys in the kitchen have been working on new sushi items that utilize less rice,” says general manager Ivy Nagayama.

I can’t help thinking of “D.K. and the guys in the kitchen” as the mad scientists of sushi: “Ah ha ha ha, taste this!”

Taste this, indeed, which we happily did last week:

Torched Kona Kampachi sashimi stuffed with sweet Maui onions, chiso and Tsukodani Yuzu Aioli and drizzlied with chili pepper tosazu ($14). The meat is firm, the sauces lightly spicy.

Or this: Japanese Hamachi and Grilled Shiitake Mushroom Tartare ($12) with truffled soy sauce, orange tobiko and chiso chiffonade ($12). It’s a tight little mound that looks like traditional poke, but tastes nothing like it. My notes from the evening for this entry read simply, “Omigod!” Ivy says it’s her favorite among the new dishes.

Then there was the Fresh Salmon Asian Carpaccio with zesty green apple-soy salsa and ikura herb salad ($12). The salmon melts in the mouth.

On the spicy side: Cajun Seared White Tuna sashimi with shaved Maui onions, red jalapeno and yukke sauce ($12).

D.K. and the Mad Sushi Scientists (now there’s a name for a band) have been a busy bunch. We also tasted:

Matsuhia Style Miso Butterfish marinated and roasted in sake and sweet miso ($11). This was perhaps the most traditional Japanese dish we sampled, but it’s several steps beyond any butterfish I’ve tasted previously. The fish is Alaskan cod.

Also semi-traditional is the Grilled Fresh Hawaiian Ahi with Sansei’s award-winning Asian Shrimp Cake with furikake yaki onigiri, ginger lime chili butter and cilantro pesto ($25), but just semi.

Spiny Lobster Tail topped with panko-crusted Spicy Crab Cake over Capellini pasta tossed with Island vegetables and creamy Sambal Aioli ($43) nearly brought us to our feet in standing ovation. The lobster was tender and smoky, the zing of the crab cake and the buttery thin noodles a fantastic complement.

Bringing down the house was Panko Crusted Ahi sashimi roll wrapped in layers of arugula and spinach, flash-fried and served in a mild soy-wasabi butter sauce ($11). The combination of crunch and smooth textures was wonderful. No wonder this one took first place at Taste of Lahaina.

Throughout these tastes, Jamie Robinson was proving why he’s perhaps the top Caucasian sake expert in town. We tried two of the three sake samplers, each a flight of three sakes ($14). The Shogun - that’s me - includes, starting with the lightest: Masumi “Okuden Kantsukuri,” called the mirror of truth, quite smooth; Kokuryu “500 Mangoku,” called black dragon, a deeper and richer flavor, and Kampoizumi “Junai Daiginjo,” an autumnal elixir that has notes of persimmon and autumn leaves.

These are, by the way, cold sakes, and Jamie has arrayed them as food pairings.

If you prefer wine, D.K. works with various winemakers to produce wines that work well with his food. On this night we tried a 2005 Muller Thurgau CF Wines Eurasia ($39 bottle), a pale, dry German wine that went well with the sushi, as did a 2006 Niersteiner Hipping CF Euro-Asian Riesling ($37 bottle). Ivy, who, like her boss, loves bringing new ideas and tastes to diners, brought out a glass of 2005 Green Lion Napa Merlot, made by Australian wine super-star Chris Ringland, which went astonishingly well with the lobster.

Sansei is located in the Waikiki Beach Marriott, and if it’s been a while, the entrance is from makai-bound Ohua Avenue.

 

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Introducing An Unusual’Cartoon’

Turn this page and you’ll find the newest MidWeek feature: Don Asmussen’s Bad Reporter.

I can assure you that this is the only time I’ve attempted to bring a “bad reporter” into these pages.

While officially called an editorial cartoon, it’s a very non-traditional sort - creating fake newspaper front pages and headlines, based on actual news.

To me, it’s terrific political/cultural satire - sort of like a late-night TV monologue, but funnier - and I hope it will bring you a few yucks, too.

Having added Ron Mizutani to our list of columnists three weeks ago, in this issue we introduce a new writer, Brandon Bosworth, who filed the Newsmaker story on energy expert Fereidun Fesharaki, a fellow at the East-West Center. A native of Iran, he sees $6-a-gallon gasoline unavoidably on our horizon. Yikes.

On another note, kudos to our cousins at the Star-Bulletin for publishing the important Esquire magazine article that led to Adm. William Fallon’s resignation/ouster as the head of the U.S. Central Command, which has oversight of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

But I must disagree with critics who compared Fallon’s disagreement with the Bush administration’s Iran policy to President Harry Truman canning Gen. Douglas MacArthur during the Korean War. The big difference is that MacArthur wanted to nuke the Chinese, then as now North Korea’s biggest ally, while Fallon, former head of U.S. Pacific Command at Camp Smith, wanted to avoid another war for our troops, possibly World War III.

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So How Do You Want To Be Dead?

My kids have probably received better Christmas presents than the one I gave them a couple of months ago - a funeral plan for their dear old Dad.

Uh, gee, thanks.

But they’ve never received a more expensive gift - not counting college - not to mention one that will save them a lot of hassles and headaches on the day that is certain to come, and in the days after.

No, as I reassured them and a couple of friends with whom I shared this news, I am not planning on being dead any time soon. I’m in good health, exercise more days than not, passed a treadmill stress test last year, love my work and love my life. I plan on being around for quite a while, enjoying my version of the good life in Hawaii.

But you never know, and this was something I felt that I needed to take care of. I share it now with MidWeek readers only as something you may want to think about for yourself. Or not.

Look at it this way: We buy car insurance and home insurance, not knowing if we’ll ever need them. So why not buy “insurance” for one of the few certainties in life?

I’d actually been thinking about buying a funeral plan for a few years, but always managed to put it off. But then last fall I received a mailer from Hawaiian Memorial Park. Not long after, I was sitting down at the Kaneohe cemetery with Linda Herman to look at and talk about all of the options.

Linda was very informative and helpful, and I actually found the process to be interesting - thinking through how I want to be dead. What I decided is that when the time comes, I want to be dead in a way that is consistent with how I’ve lived (minus the, uh, deadlines).

Before meeting with Linda, I was pretty certain I wanted to be cremated. Going through the process with her, I decided that’s definitely what I want.

But then what? Linda drove me out to a scenic overlook at Hawaiian Memorial Park, where urns are entombed in a variety of stones or in large family settings. As a single guy, I was just looking for a puka, and found a spot beside a babbling waterfall with both mountain and ocean views. It’s a lovely spot, and for a day I thought about being there. On a return visit, though, I realized that my urn would be about a foot away from a woman, Margaret somebody, born 1941, died 2005. She was probably a very nice person, but I didn’t know her. And what if she talks all the time?

So I ultimately decided to have my kids scatter my ashes at a special place at the base of the Ko’olau mountains with a view of Kaneohe Bay (and even of the MidWeek plant; the editor will be watching). It’s a beautiful, peaceful place, one to which I’ve taken them and other family and friends over the years. The kids and I went there when my daughter Dawn was home for Christmas, and as she said, “This is like your sanctuary here, Dad. I can’t imagine you being anywhere else.”

Or as my son Kai said, “Yeah, Pops, I can see coming up here and having a couple of beers with you ... Eh, howzit, home boy?”

The package I bought, including cremation and a funeral service, came to about $4,500. I also bought what could be my last plane trip to Honolulu. If I die off Oahu, the cost of my ticket home is paid. (Do you get miles with that?)

The package also came with a sort of workbook, in which I left my kids information on financial accounts, Social Security, insurance and other information they’ll need, including names and numbers of people I’d like to be notified.

At the same time, I contacted the UH John A. Burns School of Medicine and filled out papers to become a Willed Body Program donor.

Hey, if there’s a body that should be studied by science, it’s this one!

When UH medical students are done with me after a year or so, the school will cremate me and return me to my kids, after a ceremony in which other body donors are also honored. Medical students say their best teachers are these body donors, and it’s comforting to think I’ll be doing some good when I’m gone - that a person yet unborn at the time of my demise will benefit years later from a medical student’s hands-on education.

And if UH accepts me - gosh, I feel like a hopeful would-be freshman again! - my kids can roll over (so to speak) my funeral plan to use for themselves or get a partial refund. Up to them.

For more information on the UH program, Google “jabsom” and then click on departments, then on Anatomy. There’s a link to the Willed Body Program in the second paragraph.

Now that all this is decided, I feel a kind of calm - knowing that I’m choosing how and where I’ll be dead, and that my kids will not have to worry about taking care of (and paying for) all this. As Linda Herman put it, heartache is bad enough without the headaches.

By the way, my kids (now 24 and nearly 23) also got another present for Christmas. I took our old Hi-8 home videos to Alan Nielsen at Affordable Image, and he converted them to DVDs, about 10 hours in all. They enjoyed seeing and hearing themselves again as children as much as I did, and they say this one does rate among the best presents they’ve ever received.

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Bring Back The Rainbows

Good luck to June Jones, and thanks a ton for the season that none of us who lived through it will ever forget, but ...

Can we please have the Rainbows back now?

As much as Coach Jones accomplished, he was also a sometimes divisive force - just ask Joe Moore and Larry Price. The coach’s banning of Rainbows as our team’s name, and even of the rainbow logo, because for him it conjured up images of a gay rights parade is one of the silliest and most insecure things I’ve ever heard.

Whoever the new coach is - and if so many assistant coaches and players want Greg McMackin, then I’m all for him - I hope that we can return to the Rainbow Warriors.

And as much as I like the H logo and the modern uniforms, how about at least once a season bringing back the retro kelly green jerseys and somehow incorporating a rainbow onto the black/dark green unis?

And please, please, can we get rid of the silver pants and helmets? When did that become an official school color? (Only June knows.) And what does silver have to do with Hawaii? To quote the band War (which is coming to town), “Absolutely nothing!”

Another question: Why did state legislators wait so darn long to actually check out facilities on campus? It’s been nearly a year since Colt Brennan first starting talking publicly about the decrepit conditions on campus, and it was a topic for commentators on every ESPN broadcast of a UH game this season as well as during the Sugar Bowl on Fox. And as former hoops coach Riley Wallace said on Jeff Portnoy’s radio talk show on 1500AM last week, when athletic director Herman Frazier came in he was presented a poll of UH coaches and at the top of everyone’s list of priorities was facilities. Frazier promised to improve facilities and obviously failed. So the problem wasn’t exactly a secret, and legislators and the governor dropped the ball long ago.

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A Drunken Idiot, Taxes, Evel, Sevey

Why some people should not be allowed to drink (because you cannot handle, brah, you cannot handle): At the big UH-Boise State football game, a young professional guy I know was leaning on the lower-level railing of one of the bridges connecting stadium sections, watching the halftime show with half a dozen buddies, when moisture began to fall. No, not rain. They suddenly realized that someone on the upper bridge had vomited, and it hit all seven of them - and each of them had to buy a new shirt. True story, sorry to say ...

* I hope you saw Robert Novak’s columns in the past two issues of MidWeek as well as this week, reporting how a stupid squabble in Congress could mean that Americans won’t get their IRS tax refunds until weeks or months later than usual. I also hope you’ll call our Congressional delegates and tell ‘em to get their act straight - and that if your returns are late you’ll remember the next time up they’re up for re-election ...

* By the way, here are the local phone numbers for Hawaii’s D.C. Fab Four:

Sen. Dan Inouye - 541-2542

Sen. Dan Akaka - 522-8970 Rep. Neil Abercrombie - 541-2570

Rep. Mazie Hirono - 541-1986 ...

* Hearing news of the death of daredevil motorcyclist Evel Knievel, I recalled covering his ill-fated attempt to jump the Snake River canyon in a rocket-powered bike, in 1974. I was there as the sports editor of the University of Oregon’s Daily Emerald, the campus paper. The day before the launch, I was at the site just outside Twin Falls, Idaho, when Evel landed in a helicopter, and I joined a throng of people following him. We passed through a couple of gates, and at each one people dropped out, until I was one of 10 or so folks entering his quarters in the back of a big Mack truck. As folks were being seated, somebody asked if I wanted a beer. You bet. That’s when another person asked who I was. I produced my media credential, and suddenly a big bodyguard was pulling out a big pistol and pointing it at me - I think it was a Smith & Wesson .45. Whereupon I excused myself and departed, without the beer. It was the first, and I hope it remains the only, time I’ve had a gun pulled on me ...

Next day, I was stationed just to the side of the launch ramp, and recall being shocked at how slowly the rocket propelled the bike, thinking no way it’s making it to the other side. Then the parachute deployed almost immediately, and Evel crashed on the rocks below, not even making it to the river. I’ll always believe it was a cheap stunt, and that Evel never intended to make it across the huge canyon - and that all of us there, as well as a national TV audience, got suckered that day ...

* Last week’s big storm and ensuing blackout was a reminder of just how tenuous our modern life is. As a friend who stayed home with his two young sons while power was out for almost 24 hours said, “Without electricity, whew, it’s straight back to the 1800s.” ...

* It was good to see my old Columbia Inn Roundtable All-Star teammate Bob Sevey talking with Leslie Wilcox on Public TV recently. Here’s my favorite Sevey story: Back in the days when he was the most respected TV news anchor in Hawaii, Bob was playing golf at Hawaii Kai when he hooked a shot and hit a house. Upon closer inspection, Bob saw that he’d broken a glass jalousie, and that nobody was home. Returning later, he apologized to the homeowners and gave them two glass jalousies.

“Why two?” they said. “You only broke one.”

Replied Bob, “I play here every week.” ...

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Richard Pryor: Not So Crazy After All

The whole N-word thing that’s gotten my cousin the Dog into so much trouble should have been settled 30 years ago.

That’s when Richard Pryor, on his brilliant but short-lived (just five episodes) The Richard Pryor Show on NBC in 1977 said that he would no longer use the term that had played a part in many of his bits and monologues.

The title of his 1974 masterpiece album was even titled That N——-‘s Crazy.

I can’t recall Richard’s exact words from 30 years ago, but it went something like this:

I’ve decided to stop using that word. I heard a white man use it on a black brother, and it hit me - that’s not a word that we made up and chose for ourselves. It was a term made up to express ridicule and hate, and to hurt, and it was forced on us by people who had made us their slaves. I’m sorry that I ever used it to refer to another black person, and I’m not going to use it again.

The same message should get passed along to the black rappers who have sadly “popularized” the term all over again - while calling black women ho’s.

The N-word is a term that should die, and the only way to make that happen is for everyone of all races to follow Richard Pryor’s example and simply refuse to utter it, no matter the context.

To quote another of my favorite entertainers, Aretha Franklin, it’s all about R-E-S-P-E-C-T ...

* I was discussing this last week with Cedric Petty, a close friend who happens to be black.

“It’s a hot button with me,” he said of that term.

For Dog or anyone else not to realize that the N-word is an insulting and hurtful term, well, Cedric was having a hard time believing that.

“I used to be a big fan of Dog’s,” he said. “But that’s all changed.”

Lest any of us feel too superior to Dog, Cedric, a warehouse supervisor at Hagadone Printing and father of two great boys, says he sees subtle and not-so-subtle signs of racism on a regular basis.

“Awoman sees you on the street and crosses the street to avoid passing you. And there’s ‘The Look.’ It says, ‘A black person, what are you doing here?’ You wouldn’t believe how often I get that one.’”

There are a lot of stupid things in the world, but there are few stupider than judging a person’s character and worth on the basis of the color of their skin - or for using racial terms that insult and injure ...

* I’m not always a big ‘Olelo person - only so much TV you can watch in a day - but I do plan to watch town hall meetings discussing the city’s rail plans on the next several Monday evenings - and hope you will too. It is the biggest economic question - and potentially an economic disaster - facing our city and state. The shows air Mondays for the next three weeks ...

* Played golf with UH hoops coach Bob Nash - what a gentleman, a class guy all the way - in the recent Ito En charity tournament, and he told me a spooky story. He and son Bobby, one of the team’s stars, were at home taking apart a rebounding machine, meant to increase Bobby’s jumping ability. They unscrewed a bolt and it suddenly shot at Bobby like a bullet and hit him in the middle of the forehead, drawing blood. “We didn’t realize the thing was spring-loaded,” the coach said. Thankfully it didn’t hit an eye ...

Anyway, geev ‘um, Coach!

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Kauai Invaders Sweep Across Oahu

My next-door neighbors in Kaneohe hosted an extended Kauai family over a recent weekend.

I thought about throwing rocks at them, pounding on their two rental cars and screaming that their mere presence defiled my island, not to mention my street, but had more important things to do - like cleaning my fish tank.

So instead I asked them if everyone on Kauai agrees with the folks there who’ve protested the Superferry so boorishly.

“There’s only about 12 of them,” one of the women said with a dismissive shake of her head.

“We’d have loved to bring our cars over on the Superferry with everything we need to tailgate at the UH homecoming football game,” one of the men said. “That would have been perfect.”

Turns out they were also here to see Lion King and do some shopping - not to mention clog up our roads. But being the magnanimous guy that I am, I forgave them ...

* What’s going on in our ocean with all of the recent shark attacks? Oh, yeah, it’s not our ocean - it’s their ocean! And it’s obvious that the tiger shark population has rebounded after being whacked down to almost nothing in research by former UH prof Albert Tester. Following the fatal attack on Billy Weaver, of restaurant legend Spence Weaver’s family, while he was surfing off Lanikai in 1958, the state legislature gave funding to Tester do shark research. And the only way to do that is to catch and kill them. The program continued into the 1970s. Now it appears that the tigers have bounced back. My son Kai and a friend were playing catch with a football in knee-high water at Kailua Beach Park a while back when lifeguards ordered everyone out of the water - because out by a buoy marking off a swimming-only area, a big tiger was tossing a turtle into the air, taking a bite, then tossing it again. I haven’t gone swimming there since ...

The California guy who was bit last week on Maui was breaking the first rule of how not to get bit by a shark: swimming in murky water. Tiger sharks love murky water, especially near the mouths of streams, because all kinds of morsels wash down when it rains, including dead animals ...

* What’s wrong with Michelle Wie? Let’s put it this way: When Tiger Woods enrolled as a freshman at Stanford, Mommy and Daddy didn’t pack up and move to Palo Alto with him. College is where kids are supposed to start growing up and making decisions on their own - sometimes right, sometimes wrong, but that’s how kids learn to be independent adults. And if there’s any trait that history’s great golfers share, it’s being strong individuals who think for themselves ...

* No moral to this story, just a little observation: While driving on a recent sunny day, moments after seeing three teen girls walking along laughing and dressed in what seems the requisite practically nothing, I passed three elderly ladies walking along laughing, all wearing broad-brimmed hats and long-sleeved shirts. No matter the age, friends are good ...

* Speaking of the way kids dress these days: Heard about a preschool girl whose mother sent her to school on Halloween dressed as Beth Chapman, including large fake breasts ...

* As for my cousin Dog: What a sad story. But I have to disagree with a columnist for the Advertiser, who wrote that Dog’s stupid, racist rant showed his true colors. That’s just simplistic thinking. We humans are each capable of doing great good and terrible immorality - none of us is all good or all bad, not Dog and not that columnist. Unfortunately, the bad Dog spoke that day. And as you may also have learned in life, once something is said you can’t remove the words from another person’s ears and put them back in your mouth. Sad, sad…

* November, I’ve been informed, is International Drum Month. Did you know that playing the drums can burn up to 270 calories in a half-hour - more than cycling, hiking or weight lifting. It also lowers stress hormones. According to the Percussion Marketing Council, girls especially benefit from drumming: “Percussion can transform a quiet, timid, ordinary little girl into a strong, powerful, focused and confident young woman.” I’ve been fooling around with congas and various other hand drums for a decade and can attest to drumming’s therapeutic effect. For more info, please check out www.PlayDrums.Com ...

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Keeping It Green At MidWeek

MidWeek reader Adam Kahualulani Mick e-mailed me with a good question. A gardener, he wanted to use old issues as mulch in his vegetable garden, but was worried that MidWeek might be printed with a petroleum-based ink. Absolutely not. Since well before I became editor we’ve used exclusively soy-based inks. Same is true of the Star-Bulletin, which is also printed at our Kaneohe plant ...

Like Adam, you might like to know that we also have an aggressive paper recycling program, from unused/old newspapers to phone books, as well as turning the thousands of faxed pages that arrive here into pads of scratch paper ...

And kudos to Foodland, Times, Star, Longs and other merchants who now offer customers reusable grocery bags. As a bonus, they give you anywhere from three to five cents back for each bag you bring to carry home your purchases ...

Safeway also offers plastic bag recycling bins outside its stores. How many plastic bags do we really need in our landfills? And according to the Sierra Club, when one ton of plastic bags is reused or recycled, the energy equivalent of 11 barrels of oil is saved….

And more kudos: Turtle Bay is now offering golfers tees that, if left in the ground, are biodegradeable ...

Speaking of eco issues: Roy Chang’s recent cartoon about the effects of global warming - showing TheBoat making stops at downtown Honolulu street corners - made me recall that Queen Street was once on the Honolulu Harbor waterfront, as seen in a 1906 Army Corps of Engineers map. Hopefully it will not become oceanfront again ...

And speaking of global warming: The organization that received the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize awarded earlier this month, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is chaired by an East-West Center alumnus, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri. The award, shared with former Vice President Al Gore, was for “efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change.” At the East-West Center, he was involved with a number of environmental and energy projects during the 1980s, and is a great example of the wonderful and too-often unsung work that happens at the EWC ...

Full disclosure: I am rather partial to the EWC, especially after receiving a fellowship there two years ago for travel in Korea ...

Best analogy I’ve heard for why our planet is obviously heating up: Yes, we do seem to be in the early phases of a natural cycle in which the Earth’s temperatures are rising, but human activities that include deforestation and air pollution from PCBs and burning fossil fuels just multiply the effect - it’s as if we’re in a car heading toward a cliff and we’ve responded by stomping on the accelerator ...

Changing subjects: Walking through my Kaneohe neighborhood the other day, I noted that neighbors who have a variety of chew toys in the yard for their dogs have added a small football inscribed with the name of Michael Vick. A Standing O! ...

But who’s counting: Hard to believe, but last week I celebrated 28 years of writing columns in Hawaii, and next week celebrate 13 years as editor of MidWeek. Time flies when you’re having fun and working with great people ...

Our crazy language: Why don’t the first syllables of these two words rhyme? Pleasure and please ...

Just ran across a quote from humorist Malcolm Kushner: “There are three ways to get something done: Do it yourself, hire someone to do it for you, or forbid your kids to do it.”

True story ...

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Welcoming The Hopi Medicine Man

You may recall a column I wrote in May about visiting the Hopi reservation in Arizona with my just-graduated daughter Dawn, and spending time with the Hopi medicine man Grandfather Martin Gashweseoma, who’d predicted 9/11 five years before it happened.

I received several calls and e-mails from readers wanting to know how they could meet Grandfather Martin. The good news is that he’ll arrive in Honolulu on Oct. 9 for a week, thanks to my acupuncturist Dr. Peggy Oshiro and her meditation students. He’ll be visiting a number of sites on Oahu, including the Royal Mausoleum at Mauna Ala, Helemano Plantation and Sea Life Park. He’ll also visit the Hindu temple at Lawai, Kauai. His one public talk will be at Hawaii Business Equipment on Oct. 12, 7 p.m. Seating is limited. For more information, call Gladys at 396-9703 ...

(If you missed it, you can see that original column at http://www.midweek.com/content/columns/editorsdesk_article/lunch_with_the_h opi_medicine_man/ ...)

By the way, for readers who may also recall my writing about my daughter Dawn’s first day of kindergarten at Kamehameha and various other milestones between then and her college graduation from Northern Arizona U. at Flagstaff in May, she was just hired as a claims adjustor by an insurance company in Phoenix. Few things have given me such a parental thrill as receiving her first e-mail from her work address, with her name and title at the bottom. Yup, I’m a proud pop ...

We’re all sorry to see Lisa Asato leave our staff for another opportunity. She’s been an important part of Team MidWeek, a smart young woman who is a hard worker - always a tough combination to beat - and whose calm personality was much appreciated. We wish her all the best ...

Taking her place is Alana Chun Folen, who just graduated from the UH-Manoa journalism program. We see a great future for this talented young writer ...

Another big change here is that Yu Shing Ting - another smart, hard-working young woman - goes on maternity leave this week. The baby boy was expected by Tuesday. Yu Shing does so much for both editions of MidWeek, we’ll miss her and eagerly await her return ...

Filling in for Yu Shing is Sarah Pacheco, another recent UH journalism grad. While I was interviewing her for the job, Sarah glanced at some photos on my office wall and exclaimed, “Oh my gosh, you’re Dawn and Kai Chapman’s dad!” Turns out she was my son Kai’s classmate at Kamehameha (class of ‘03). It’s a small world, and a smaller island, but Sarah got the job on her own merits. We’re glad to have her ...

Hiring people the same age as my children doesn’t exactly make me feel older, but it doesn’t make me feel any younger either ...

Dining tip: Just tried Cassis, Chef Mavro’s downtown restaurant, for the first time and it was one of the greatest dinners I’ve ever enjoyed. Reasonable prices, wonderful food and ambiance, with a perfect wine pairing for each dish, including dessert. Onolicious barely does the fare at Cassis justice ...

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A Note, Li’ Dat, To Kauai Protestors

Here’s what Braddah Bash (as in Cala-) has to say to residents of Kauai who protested the arrival of the Superferry:

Mahalo for da aloha, li’ dat, when us Oahu guys try come Kauai on da Supahferry.

Not!

OK, OK, so we know you special, eh - Kauai is da one island Kamahemaha da Greates’ nevah wen’ conquer. Jus’ one leetle remindah, tho: Your chief joined da kingdom, and now you part of da state. Fo’ real! E komo mai!

And da folks you protesting against an’t'rowing rocks at is us Oahu peoples - local kine folks like you, yeah?

From what I saw in da paper an’ on top da TV, you t’ink we make less traffics if we fly ovah on one airplane and rent one car, ‘stead of taking da ferry wit’ our own vehicles. You know, ‘as kinda like my auntie - to make her coat less heavy, she cut off da buttons and put’ em in da pockets ...

Speaking of pockets, I kinda wonder who’s slipping some kala in your pockets fo’make you ac’ so lolo ...

‘An what, you want us protest when you try come Oahu fo’shop Ala Moana? Better watch it, we get plenny more peoples den you. So you like see one protest, ho, we show you one protest…

‘Kay den…

Mahalo, Braddah Bash. And speaking of Kauai, here’s one less reason to visit the Emerald Isle: The back nine of the Kiele course at Kauai Lagoons, much of which runs along the ocean and overlooks Nawiliwili Harbor, is being plowed under to make way for luxury homes and condos. As you may know, I write for a number of Mainland magazines about golf, and have rated Kiele No. 1 in Hawaii, and that back nine as Hawaii’s best nine holes. It may be Jack Nicklaus’best design work anywhere, and ‘scuse me if I can’t help taking this like a death in the family…

So in the spirit of a wake here’s a true tale: When Kiele first opened, you could drive your cart nearly all the way to the green of the short, severely downhill 16th hole, with the the harbor on the left side. The reason fencing was later put in to prevent carts from going so far down the hill is that a couple from Japan was speeding down the hill, lost control of the cart and managed to leap safely from the cart just before it plunged off the cliff onto the rocks far below ...

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A Tough Way To Make $575

There’s gotta be an easier way to make $575: Did you see that the copper wiring stolen from the Campbell High football stadium, and later recovered, was valued at a whopping $575? Let’s see, you do something that could get you arrested, not to mention cause your death either by falling from a pole or by electrocution, for $575? Sounds like a heckuva job description to me ...

The kicker, of course, is that the thief apparently abandoned the wire, along with his car, and won’t make a dime. This one is worthy of our Chuck Shepherd’s Weird News column ...

It also seems a crime that the cost of repairing Campbell’s lights is estimated to be $25,000 ...

Speaking of weird news: A Mainland eco group that wants to promote a concert at Magic Island is asking the city to first take away 15 big trees. Eh, go save somebody else’s planet, pal ...

This one makes me “green,” alright - as in nauseous! ...

Driving down Kahala Avenue for the first time in a while, I was amazed that our town’s priciest neighborhood has Third World streets just like the rest of us. How about that? ...

Does anybody else feel like the city’s proposed rail plan is getting rammed down our throats? ...

I got to ride two fixed-rail lines recently - in Las Vegas, where the train is such a bust that it can’t even pay for its own debt service, and Portland, where TriMet is popular and well-ridden, largely because it goes where people want to go - including downtown and the airport, unlike the Honolulu plan. Seems to me that success or failure of a rail system - based on how many people actually ride the train - depends largely on how good your plan is. My concern with the mayor’s planned route is that it’s fatally flawed - it’s not going where people want and need to go ...

But, hey, these are the waning days of summer, so lighten up, brah ...

I’ve been learning that summer isn’t quite as much fun when your favorite baseball team - in this case the San Francisco Giants - is one of the worst teams in baseball and seems to invent new ways of losing every day. But even worse news was seeing a report that a Giants fan was tossed out of San Francisco’s beautiful bayside stadium for chanting “Dodgers suck!” Which is ridiculous, because the fan is right. And if you can’t hate the sucky Dodgers, and tell them so, what’s the point of being a Giants fan, especially in a season like this when we suck even worse? ...

Thanks to readers for appreciative e-mails regarding last week’s column on Churchill’s Folly in Iraq. It’s such a fascinating book, when I was finished nearly every page had been marked up with a highlighter ...

But I also got in some lighter reading this summer. If you’re also a fan of the delightful madman Christopher Moore, his new novel You Suck, a modern vampire love story, has some good laughs ...

Our crazy language: Why don’t we pronounce the wh in “while” as we do in “whole”? ...

No wonder UH-Manoa does big business with foreign students taking English as a Second Language classes ...

With the end of summer coming, are you ready for some football? ...

I sure am, but maybe you’re also wishing you could get more excited about UH’s weak-sister football schedule in Colt Brennan’s final year. There are only so many 62-7 games you can stand watching, even if you’re winning, and I see a bunch of ‘em coming…

But then that’s why God invented tailgating, isn’t it? ...

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Following Churchill’s Folly In Iraq

“When Iraq becomes strong enough in our opinion to stand alone, we shall be in a position to state that our task has been fulfilled, and that Iraq is an independent sovereign state. But this cannot be said while we are forced year after year to spend very large sums of money on helping the Iraqi government to defend itself and maintain order.”

Sound familiar? Perhaps like something you’ve heard from a stay-the-course advocate, circa 2004-7?

Nope, it’s Winston Churchill, writing in 1922 as head of Britain’s Colonial Office. At the time, Prince Feisal - whom Churchill had appointed king of the nascent nation of Iraq, whose borders Churchill had drawn up the previous year - was balking at the protectorate agreement the British wanted. To rule a land and people with whom he was largely unfamiliar, Feisal, a native of the Arabian Peninsula and not the land between the Tigris and Euphrates, and who had spent much of his life in Turkish Constantinople, needed legitimacy - and as much independence from the British as he could get.

Which is much the same problem that the American-supported government and army of Iraq are having today.

That, and the above quote, are just two among endless parallels between the British experience in Iraq and the American experience 80-plus years later - as reported in Churchill’s Folly, by historian Christopher Catherwood (2004, Carroll & Graf). It wasn’t written yet when the Bush administration invaded Iraq in 2003, but the information was there for the learning if anyone in the White House had cared to pursue it. E-mail subject: Things To Avoid in Iraq! For this book, Catherwood relies heavily on the archived letters and memos written by the remarkably prolific Churchill.

Abrief bit of background that is necessary to understand the current situation: The Ottoman Empire based in modern-day Turkey ruled from 1299 until 1920, at its peak controlling three continents. Already with their empire in decline, the Ottomans sided with Germany in World War I, and in its defeated aftermath saw remnants of the empire subdivided, with Western nations given “mandates” by the League of Nations to govern various areas. The United States was given present-day Armenia, but the isolationist administration of President Woodrow Wilson - the U.S. was not even a member of the League of Nations - chose not to get involved. The French got what today is Syria and Lebanon, and the Brits got what is now Iraq, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, among other real estate. A map of the region before Churchill convened what he called his “40 Thieves” in Cairo in April 1921 to draw up new national boundaries shows not countries, but tribal areas - the Ibn Saud clan ruling the Nejd on the Arabian Peninsula and the rival Hussein clan ruling the neighboring Hejaz along the Red Sea, to name the largest two. They often skirmished, and the Sauds also had their eyes on what would become Kuwait.

Note: The Husseins, also known as Hashemites and unrelated to Saddam, are descended from the prophet Mohammed and held the position of Sharif of Mecca. They are key characters in the film Lawrence of Arabia and the book about the Arab Revolt against the Ottomans on which it is based, Seven Pillars of Wisdom - although Catherwood says the historical details of both are quite wrong and based largely on the fantasies of T.E. Lawrence. Nevertheless, Churchill dragged the old desert soldier out of retirement, and Lawrence became one of those “40 Thieves,” and much responsible for Churchill agreeing to put Hussein’s son Feisal on the new Iraqi throne (after he tried usurping the new throne in Syria until the French kicked him out). Feisal’s brother Abdullah would become king of the new country of Jordan.

Call it arrogance, perhaps: Churchill had never actually visited what was then called Mesopotamia when he arbitrarily drew up the borders for a new land called Iraq, doing so in Egypt, although he did visit Jerusalem.

And while Catherwood writes that Churchill was well aware of Sunni-Shia differences in the region, he ignored them as well as tribal boundaries. Thus Churchill, the classic colonialist, brought a Sunni from outside Iraq to rule a country that was two-thirds Shia.

As for the Kurds in the north, they were Sunni but not Arabic. The “40 Thieves” discussed creating a separate Kurdish nation, but failed to do so - Kurdish homelands were split between Iraq, Turkey, Iran and Syria - to the continuing detriment of the Kurdish people.

In short: Three nations - for Shia, Sunni and Kurds - could have been created at a time when Arab nationalism was rising, and such an idea might have been popular. Or the Brits could have simply let those tribal lands revert to their traditional ways. But that is not the way of empires, and today the Iraqis - and Americans - are paying for it.

Oil was not yet an issue for the Brits - Iraqi oil was still just speculation in 1922 - but they had their own economic self-interest here. As Colonial secretary, Churchill was interested in Iraq because it would save several days in the time it took to send troops and goods from England to India, then the UK’s prize colony. And Churchill, Catherwood shows again and again, was chiefly interested in saving the British Empire money - call it empire on the cheap.

Thus it was that troop levels were always an issue, with British generals saying that far more troops were necessary to stabilize Iraq than Churchill and politicians in London wanted to hear. Ask retired Gen. Eric Shinseki if that sounds familiar.

Feisal would turn out to be a terrible choice for reasons greater than his religion. He was simply not a good ruler, his administration disorganized at best. That said, as Catherwood points out, the British presence that lasted until 1932 never allowed Feisal any true legitimacy in the eyes of the Iraqi people. Who’s in charge here? He died in 1933, succeeded by the young playboy King Ghazi.

Churchill’s formula created inherent instability in Iraq - in the nation’s first 37 years, there were 58 different governments! The bloody Baathist overthrow of 1958 ended the Hashemite monarchy, and especially after Saddam Hussein seized power in 1979 would show that only an iron-fisted dictator could hold a country of such disparate parts together.

So what might this history mean for America and Iraq?

The greatest problem, it seems to me, is that Iraq was never a nation of ideals, or dreams, or unified core beliefs or ethnicity. Today, Catherwood points out, the people of Iraq still identify themselves more by tribal and religious affiliation than as patriotic Iraqis. They may cheer the Iraqi soccer team, because they love soccer and it’s the only team they have, but they don’t get all chickenskin when they hear their national anthem.

And the concept of democracy does not resonate; they are content with a system that offers security, and a religion that provides answers for life’s vagaries.

It seems unlikely to the point of impossibility that the Shia majority, dominated by a Sunni minority going back to the Ottomans and then by a Western-appointed monarchy followed by a military dictatorship, will ever give up the dominance they now and newly enjoy. Share power? Ha!

It seems equally unlikely that the long-dominant Sunnis would allow themselves to become a persecuted minority, or that the Kurds of Iraq, with a strong regional government now in place and lots of oil underfoot, would be willing to be dominated by Arabs of either Muslim stripe. And why share?

And it seems there is no essential reason for these very different people to find a unifying cause other than oil profits. But that would involve sharing, and that’s a problem.

Whether it was the British in 1921 or Americans today, Western powers have dictated what Iraq is and what Iraqi policy should be. The stated Bush agenda to establish democracy in Iraq is a lovely idea, but so is money growing on trees. For Iraqis, democracy is not a golden ideal, but just another Western concept being forced upon them by violent means.

Even if some kind of democracy prevails in Iraq, says Catherwood, expect it to act rather as Feisal did with the Brits who put him in power: ungrateful. There was never a pro-British government under the Hashemite monarchy, and there is not likely to be a pro-American government that follows our exit.

Whether U.S. troops leave Iraq tomorrow or next year or even beyond that, it’s highly unlikely that ancient tribal and religious identities will be superseded by national pride.

As Catherwood points out, whether it was artificially configured Yugoslavia or the French creation of Lebanon, nations drawn up by outside forces are never successful for very long. The U.S. invasion of Iraq and the bloody chaos it set loose seems to bear out that historical verity.

Yes, Iraqi oil is our economic self-interest, and a very serious one, but this should give Americans even more reason to find other ways to power our cars, homes and businesses, and our nation.

Bottom line: I can’t see any way that America can get out of Iraq without the serious involvement and cooperation of the Arabic Sunni Saudis, the Persian Shia Iranians and the Sunni Turks - a treaty between those traditional regional rivals allowing Sunni, Shia and Kurdish home-lands in the former Iraq would be a good start, and would provide a sort of buffer among those powers.

And I can’t see a way out of Iraq without finally letting the people of the region redraw their own borders. They’ve been subject to outside dominance since 1299 - a mere 708 years. They could hardly do any worse than Western meddlers have done.

Will there be bloodshed as they sort it out? To answer with a double question: Is there unconscionable bloodshed happening in Iraq now? And how else do you propose to stop it?

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Another Happy MidWeek Birthday

Happy Birthday to us! With the publication of MidWeek‘s weekend paper last week, we began the paper’s 24th year of publication.

And to think that some media wise guys predicted MidWeek wouldn’t last two years.

I was a daily columnist at the Advertiser when the first MidWeek hit homes on July 18, 1984 - Joe Moore was featured on the cover, wearing his Columbia Inn Roundtable All-Stars softball uniform. But what I really remember is the immediate hit the Advertiser took in advertising revenues when the supermarkets began choosing the little weekly paper to carry their inserts. I remember it because my expense account got severely whacked.

By the way, for those of you who are old enough to remember my years of daily columnizing, I’ve now been at MidWeek longer than I was at the Advertiser.

Especially gratifying is the growth of our readership. A year ago we passed the Sunday Advertiser in readership - we’re at about 467,000 and growing, making MidWeek the most popular publication in Hawaii.

And of course there are now two MidWeeks every week. Our fantastic staff also produces four MidWeek Islander community newspapers for Windward, West, East and Central Oahu, as well as Oahu Military Star, an independent weekly military newspaper.

And far from the little shopper that was MidWeek in 1994, we’ve won a number of journalism awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and the Hawaii Publishers Association, including being named the best non-daily paper in Hawaii.

I give a ton of credit to Ron Nagasawa, who after being promoted from assistant publisher to publisher in late 2001 has instituted some exciting changes, and has given us stable and smart leadership. With this issue we introduce Doctor In The House, a weekly medical Q&A column in which Lisa Asato interviews a different doc each week.

Another key but quiet member of our staff is senior editor Terri Hefner. I dread the weeks she goes on vacation. And Dennis Francis has brought great energy and ideas to the company since coming over from the Advertiser to become company president three years ago.

We’re grateful that you and so many of your friends, family, colleagues and neighbors choose to spend part of your busy week with MidWeek, and are always mindful that we are writing stories and shooting photos for you.

We are also grateful to our advertisers, so please support them, because they pay the bills so we can bring MidWeek to you.

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Finally, Good News For Pali Golfers

You may recall a strongly worded column I wrote on Feb. 7, “The Sad State Of City Golf Courses,” after playing Pali and West Loch and finding their conditions deplorable - with large areas of dead grass and bare dirt on putting greens and fairways.

Pali, which I’ve been playing and enjoying since 1984, was especially tragic - like seeing a loved one with a terminal illness slowly wasting away.

As I said then, when playing a muni I don’t expect the perfectly manicured conditions of, say, a Mauna Lani or a Kapalua course. But I do expect an actual golf course with actual grass on fair-ways and greens.

Now there’s good news to report for fellow Pali fans. Here’s how I stumbled upon it.

While chatting last Thursday at the MidWeek/Star-Bulletin Hawaii’s Best awards party at the Honolulu Design Center with my old friend John Fuhrman, who runs the city’s Blaisdell Center and the Waikiki Shell, he introduced me to his boss, Sidney Quintal, director of the Department of Enterprise Services.

“Don Chapman!” he said. “You’re the guy who wrote all that stuff about Pali Golf Course!”

That’s me, I said, and it’s true, Pali’s condition is really crappy.

“I’m the guy in charge of it,” he said.

Well, how do you do?

It turns out that column was well-read at Honolulu Hale.

“I won’t say that it was the sole reason for what’s happening, but it did get some people’s attention at City Hall,” Sidney said.

People, I inferred, like Mayor Mufi.

Whatever the case, Sidney said that column helped prompt some changes. The most dramatic is that this week public bids close for the job of redoing each of Pali’s 18 greens.

“We’re bringing in all new turf,” Sidney said excitedly.

He said they’re going all out, and that the course will be closed for a month.

He also said that he’s now having weekly meetings with his course superintendents, and doing regular observation tours of each of the city’s six golf courses.

The other great news for Pali golfers is that Sidney has hired Leighton Wong, the guy who kept Royal Kunia green and alive during the bare-bones decade the City Council shut it down after the former Japanese owner went bankrupt and did not pay the multi-million-dollar “use fee” the city demanded. Leighton knows how to take care of a golf course on a limited budget and is the perfect guy for the mayor’s policy of not creating anything if it can’t be properly maintained.

With Leighton there, I see great things ahead for one of my favorite courses. In fact, I’ve

always said Pali has the capacity to be one of the top 10 courses in Hawaii if it just received decent maintenance, and could be to Honolulu what legendary Harding Park is to San Francisco

Anyway, Sidney promised that when the new greens are ready he’d invite me out to play, and he hoped that I’d write about that experience.

You can count on it.

I also mentioned to Sidney that I’d recently played West Loch again, as well as Makalena. West Loch was improved, though with still too many patches of bare dirt in fairways. Makalena’s greens were remarkably good, and the course is vastly improved from the last time I played it.

By the way, Sidney and John were at the bash for Hawaii’s Best (as voted by our readers) to receive the award for best venue to hear live music, which went to the Waikiki Shell - a real shocker there, eh.

They were also pleased to report that they have the funds to replace seats at the Shell.

That’s a good thing too, because the last time I sat there for a concert - Bonnie Raitt last winter - many seats were dangerously rickety and rusting with sharp metal edges. They’re at least as bad as the seats at UH’s Les Murakami Stadium, and that’s saying something.

But that’s another column.

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Lunch With The Hopi Medicine Man

I was standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona ... not that it’s pertinent to anything, really, but there I was a couple of weeks ago, standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona, and I’ve never before had the opportunity to start a column with the line from the iconic Jackson Browne-Eagles hit Take It Easy, and am not likely to ever get another, so ...

We - my daughter Dawn and I on the day after her graduation from Northern Arizona U. in Flagstaff, as well as my Honolulu acupuncturist Dr. Peggy Oshiro and several of her meditation students in two other vehicles - were making a pit stop in Winslow en route to the Hopi Indian reservation. There we were to have lunch with the medicine man who five years before 9/11 predicted a foreign attack by airplanes on two New York high-rises, killing thousands, causing a war about money and oil ...

After a drive through the Painted Desert and past fantastic rock formations and remnants of the ancient inland sea (where fossilized sea creatures are found at 5,000 feet elevation), we meet the Hopi spiritual leader in a restaurant on Second Mesa ...

His name is Martin Gashweseoma - pronounced the way it looks - but people simply call him Grandfather Martin. He is 85, and when he speaks he looks you directly, unwaveringly in the eye. He was trained in the ways of the spirit world and the ancient practices of the Hopi people by his uncle Yeukioma, who spent 17 years imprisoned on Alcatraz for hiding his children and refusing to send them away to the white man’s schools, in 1906. Like the Dalai Lama, whom he has met twice, Grandfather Martin has been invited to speak at the United Nations ...

The peaceful Hopi originated with the Mayans of Central America, he says, but at some point they migrated north. Up at Third Mesa where he lives is the village of Oraibi, believed to be the longest continuously inhabited piece of real estate in North America - for at least 1,100 years ...

After lunch, I drive Grandfather Martin up to his house at Third Mesa with Dawn and his friend Sakina Blue-Star. Streets are sandy, and on the roof of his traditional home he’s raising three juvenile golden eagles, a spiritual symbol for the Hopi. Grandfather Martin invites us in to talk some more, and he is no more enthusiastic about the world today than he was when he predicted 9/11. Producing a copy of the “Mayan Codex,” a series of highly complex hieroglyphics, he explains the meaning. The first three figures representing the Hopi people survive attacks from Spaniards and other outside forces because they remain rooted in Mother Earth. Only when they forsake those essential roots do his people - and all people, he says - lose their way ...

Following Mayan-Hopi belief, Grandfather Martin says we are nearing the end of the “fourth world,” which will end with a complete “cleansing.” He draws a finger across his throat, and the Mayan drawing indeed shows the head of the fourth, rootless figure being severed. He urges wealthy people to spend their money now, and tells Hopi people to remain living in their villages high on the mesas to remain safe. After the cleansing, he believes a fifth world is coming, one populated by “onehearted people who all speak the same language.” ...

I ask if there is anything that we can do as individuals for this world. “It is set. You first have to heal yourself,” he says, and it echoes words I’d heard from the Dalai Lama barely two weeks earlier on Maui ...

We’re struck by the similarities between Hopi and native Hawaiian culture and beliefs. In fact, Grandfather Martin was invited to the Big Island a few years ago to interpret cave petroglyphs. After coming down from Third Mesa, we’re invited into the home of a Hopi woman named Rowena, Sakina’s hanai daughter, who is a member of the Hopi’s Sand people. Their aumakua, as it were, is the lizard - just like the Hawaiian mo’o. She greets us with chanting, while burning sage and waving the smoke toward us. When we leave, she asks us to pray for rain - up on the mesas the Hopi people are feeling the effects of climate warming, and the level in the natural spring from which Grandfather Martin and other Hopi draw their daily water is dropping year to year ...

Back in Flagstaff, a newspaper story reports that climate warming is happening in the American Southwest at a faster rate than in the rest of the country. Unfortunately, warmer also means drier ...

Speaking of the Dalai Lama, here are a few out-takes from my May 16 cover story:

* The 14th Dalai Lama, his representative in the U.S. Tashi Wangdi says, is not a big follower of sports or popular culture, but he has seen the films Kundun, which tells the story of how he was discovered, trained and then forced into exile at age 24, and Seven Years in Tibet, starring Brad Pitt. Of those, Kundun is the more historically accurate. He has never seen Caddie Shack, nor Bill Murray’s classic ramble about ending up at a Tibet golf course and caddying for the Dalai Lama: “He’s a big hitter, the lama, long ... We finish 18 and he’s gonna stiff me, so I say, Hey, lama, how about a little something for the effort, you know? So he says, Oh, no money, but when you die, on your deathbed you’ll receive total consciousness. So I got that going for me, which is nice.” But His Holiness does watch in-flight movies, and when he ran into Robin Williams started laughing and exclaiming “Ah, Mrs. Doubtfire, very funny!”

* As he did for the Dalai Lama’s visit to the Big Island in 1990, Shep Gordon, the Maui agent who coordinated the Maui events, arranges for special meals for the Lama, and again for Maui artist Piero Resta and his potter wife Gail to create dinner plates, bowls and cups with Buddhist symbols. The food is prepared by Mark Ellman - asparagus soup, filet mignon and grilled salmon from his Mala Ocean Tavern in Lahaina on the first day. Filet mignon? “I was blown away, I thought he was a vegetarian,” says Chef Mark. “But the Tibetans are big meat eaters. It’s cold up there.” The next day’s menu from Mark’s Penne Pasta Cafe was scrapped when the Lama called and said he was in the mood for French onion soup and Pasta Bolognese. Shep and wife Renee Loux were previously married by the Dalai Lama, and for dessert he was served Renee’s Dolphin Vegan cookies with wild jungle fruits from Hana.

* Shep says it makes sense to follow the Dalai Lama’s teachings if for no other reason than self-interest: “In a very selfish sense, if you practice compassion, you’re guaranteed to get happy.”

* Going through security at the Kahului airport on my way back to Oahu, I was gathering my stuff out of the plastic bin and putting on my shoes when a woman in a National Transportation Safety Board uniform spotted my copy of the Maui Arts and Cultural Center magazine with the Dalai Lama’s smiling face on the cover. She asked if I’d had it autographed, and I said no. “Oh,” she said, “I did!” It turns out even the Dalai Lama has to go through airport security. She asked him for an autograph, he obliged and shook her hand. She looked me in the eye and said earnestly: “It was a life-changing moment, you know.” I said I understood, that I’d never forget the two days at the stadium. “OK, gimme five!” she said, held up a blue latex-gloved hand, and I slapped her five. “You have a really wonderful day, sir,” she said as I departed.

And I thought, eh, maybe there is something to this compassion stuff. Because if you can get people at the airport to treat you like a human, with compassion, then ... who knows?

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Pitching A Tribute To A Teammate

I heard about Don Ho’s untimely passing while driving to town - from, of all people, Don Robbs, who was broadcasting a UH baseball game at Fresno State on the radio. Ironic, because back in the days of the infamous Columbia Inn Roundtable All-Stars softball team, the pitching rotation was Don Ho, Don Robbs and Don Chapman ...

The thing I’ll always remember about Don Ho as a softball teammate was how down to earth he was - just one of the guys. And in his day, he was a pretty good athlete ...

(Note to Gene Kaneshiro: Eh, let’s get the gang back together, while we still can ...)

We’re proud to say that Don appeared on MidWeek‘s cover three times - originally on March 6, 1985, in the paper’s first year; with daughter Hoku on Oct. 20, 1999, and most recently with children from the Aha Punana Leo Hawaiian immersion school on Dec. 6 of last year…

As Jack Nicklaus once said of Arnold Palmer - “I don’t think anyone enjoys being themself more than Arnie enjoys being Arnie.” - I doubt that anyone enjoyed being himself more than Don ...

As talented as Don was as an entertainer, he also had a great talent for choosing good friends. I recall a story told by the late restaurateur Henry Loui, the guy I call my Chinese father, about “busting heads” of some tough guys who wanted to beef with Don when was he was just starting out in Waikiki. As I recall Henry saying, Don had flirted with one of their girlfriends from the stage ...

They remained friends over the years, and so when Don sang Kui Lee’s I’ll Remember You at Henry’s funeral in 1991, there was some extra feeling to it ...

And the Feb. 1, 1995, MidWeek cover story I wrote about Larry Mehau - second in a two-part series that dispelled any notion of Rick Reed’s “godfather” nonsense - includes a tale I’d first heard from Eddie Sherman, which Larry confirmed. During the ‘70s, in Don’s dressing room at the Polynesian Palace showroom on Lewers, with Eddie and Tommy Campos in attendance, a Mainland crime figure tried to extort protection money from Don, who was visibly perspiring with nervousness:

“Yeah, when Don got in trouble, I tried to take care of the problem,” Larry recalled. (They were pals from Kamehameha Schools days.) “I wouldn’t say Mafia, but he was with a Mainland crime faction. The guy said, ‘If you don’t like what’s going on, I have instructions, all I have to do is call the big boys on the Mainland.’ I handed him the phone: ‘OK, you better start calling, pally, because you in trouble here. If you looking for trouble, I’m gonna help you find it. So call whoever told you to come over here. And if your orders are to continue, I hope you can swim good. There’s no place for you to hide, and you’re going to have to swim a long way.’ They (organized crime) don’t like that kind of talk, But if they talk to you like that, what are you supposed to do? Eat it? B———-!”

And that was the end of that problem for Don ...

Hang loose forever, brother ...

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Awful Drivers, A Great Golfer, Etc.

Where’s a cop - or a handful of carpet tacks - when you need ‘em? My pal Dr. Mark Stitham forwards a YouTube video, shot apparently by a young Marine from Kaneohe, although it could just as easily be a civilian employee. The camera shows his speedometer and the road ahead as he accelerates past the base sentry booth onto the H-3, quickly hitting and maintaining speeds over 150 mph as he dangerously weaves in and out of traffic, even passing other vehicles on the shoulder of the road, reaching the Halawa interchange in barely five minutes. The bike, it says, is a 2004 Yamaha R6 - so it shouldn’t be too tough to track him down. You can view his criminally self-centered act at www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTFWfJZqzHo ...

Only slightly less idiotic was the guy in a car I saw running every red light as he sped up Pali Highway from town the other day - too quick, alas, to get a license number ...

But driving stupidity isn’t always reckless - sometimes it comes veiled as courtesy. A guy I know recently rear-ended a woman driver when she suddenly slammed on the brakes - on a busy four-lane highway - to let a pedestrian cross. Good drivers know what’s going on behind them as well as ahead of them, and are as courteous aft as they are fore ...

Speaking of fore: The Aloha Section PGA will be inducting Dick McClean into the Hawaii Golf Hall of Fame this month, and it’s a well-deserved honor for one of the game’s truly nice guys. In the 1980s and early ‘90s, Dick was Da Man of island golf, winning a ton of tournaments and helping to revive the Hawaii State Open.

Here’s how good Dick hits it: Before the Plantation Course officially opened at Kapalua in 1991, Dick was playing a round with Mark Rolfing and some other pals, and on the par-3 second hole, with the usual trade wind at their backs, scored a hole-in-one with a 6-iron. A week later, Mark invited NBC broadcast partners Johnny Miller and Charlie Jones to play the Plantation. This time, with a kona wind howling into their faces, Dick pulled out his driver on the second hole and scored another ace! ...

The induction dinner, by the way, happens at the Hawaii Prince Hotel on April 30. For ticket info, call 593-2230 ...

Speaking of golf: I’ve been going around and playing city golf courses, and will be doing a follow-up to the recent column on how terrible conditions are (still) at Pali ...

And speaking of awards: Please join me in offering kudos to Linda Dela Cruz of the MidWeek staff. On April 27, she’ll receive the Small Business Administration’s journalist of the year award for Oahu. Linda writes our Entrepreneurs column and edits the Movers column, so she’s well-plugged into the Hawaii business scene. This follows Katie Young’s award from the Hawaii Psychiatric Association and Bobby Curran, who writes for our weekend paper, being named Hawaii sportscaster of the year. I’m proud to work with such talented and hard-working folks ...

The SBA awards luncheon happens at the Hyatt Regency. For ticket info, call 526-1001 ...

Oh, and MidWeek just took second place in the state publishers association Pa’i Awards, for best non-daily paper. Pacific Business News won that, so you could say MidWeek is the best non-business non-daily with circulation of 268,000 and reader-ship of 467,000 - although with Linda’s award, plus the Business Roundtable column edited by Kerry Miller, we feel pretty good about our business coverage too ...

Good name for the state Ethics Commission’s newsletter, eh: The High Road ...

With so many people already running for president in 2008, you’d think there would be more appealing candidates. But as an independent, I wouldn’t vote yet for any of the frontrunners - especially with everybody dodging serious issues ...

Go figgah ...

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Let’s Put Music Back In Schools

I’ve been thinking lately about the dearth of music programs in our public schools, and talking with a variety of people about what might be done to create a non-profit organization that would encourage and support school music programs.

A press release I received last Thursday was the kick in the head I needed to mention it in this space:

The eight winners of the Honolulu Symphony’s competition for young musicians represent just three private schools - and six of them attend Punahou.

Congratulations to each of them - they, their parents, peers and teachers should be proud.

But still ... not one public school kid!

One of the sad truths about our public schools is that they largely deprive children of both the immediate and lifelong benefits of musical education.

Repeated studies have shown that young people who study music do better in core academic subjects, and the earlier they’re exposed to music the better. And playing well and performing also build self-esteem - the real kind that is based on actually accomplishing something.

Yes, there are the Pearl City High and Roosevelt High bands, which have marched in the Macy’s Thanksgiving and Rose Bowl parades, and the musical theater program at Castle High, which has sent grads on to Broadway.

But those gleaming examples are exceptions. All of our students deserve such opportunities.

My own experience - forced, and initially mortified, to take orchestra in the seventh grade because art and band classes were filled - opened the wonderful world of classical music, which has given me countless hours of pleasure. Playing string bass in orchestra - even making all-city orchestra in Salem, Ore., although that’s kind of like being on the all-Honolulu toboggan team - led to playing in a jazz quartet, and later to a bass guitar in rock bands, and a lifetime of enjoying music of all kinds from country to opera.

Talking about this subject over a recent lunch with my friend Dr. Mark Stitham, he shared a great quote from Voltaire:

“A life without music would be a mistake.”

I also spoke with Johnny Kai of the Music Foundation of Hawaii, which contributes funds to the state Department of Education. As a professional musician, be believes school music programs would provide a career path for local students who could earn music scholarships to college and grow up to earn a living playing music, whether in Waikiki or in the symphony or Royal Hawaiian Band, or beyond our shores. He is also convinced that a study needs to be done that would prove to legislators the economic benefits of music in Hawaii, which he believes runs into the multi-millions of dollars.

As Johnny says, “Music is one of the reasons people come to Hawaii.”

My ideas are admittedly still rough, but I believe that if our legislators will not better support music education - and a bill this year would make the decision on music or no music up to individual school principals, whose needs are great and budgets are tight - then concerned citizens, parents and community and business leaders need to step up. For starters, I’ve discovered a couple of national foundations that provide a framework for organization.

Music is just too important to deny it to children whose parents can’t afford to send them to private schools.

If you’re interested in working to form such an organization, please e-mail me at:

.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

And if you’d like to see how wonderfully children can play, those eight contest winners - ranging from age 10 to 18 - perform in concert Saturday evening at the Blaisdell Concert Hall, with Henry Miyamura conducting.

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A Dishonest Book And A True Tale

This column is written especially for Hawaii schoolteachers who may assign what I find to be an offensive book, and for the parents of young students who may bring that book home.

It’s probable that there are historically accurate elements in the book So Far From the Bamboo Grove by Yoko Kawashima Watkins - the autobiographical tale of an 11-year-old Japanese girl fleeing Korea with her family at the end of WWII, highlighted by a few Koreans killing and raping Japanese.

In fact, I don’t for a moment doubt some of that happened.

But let’s put it in an honest perspective:

The U.S. victory in the Pacific and Japan’s surrender aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay ended 36 years of brutal Japanese occupation of Korea that included Japanese soldiers forcing Korean women into prostitution and forcing young Korean men to hard labor in coal mines that provided fuel for the Japanese war machine. And as I learned in Korea during my East-West Center fellowship and U.S.-Korea Journalists Exchange, the Japanese removed Prince Yongchin, younger brother of Sunjong, last monarch of the native Choson (Jeoson) Dynasty that had ruled since 1392, and forced him to marry a minor Japanese princess, Masako Nashimoto. That effectively dead-ended the Korean royal line. The Japanese also sent Korean rice and other produce back to Japan, thus forcing many Koreans to starve. And they relocated Korea’s best artists and craftsmen to Japan, made the Korean language illegal on the peninsula and forced Koreans to take Japanese names.

That’s a lot of ironfisted forceds. And let’s be clear on this point: Japanese citizens in Korea in August 1945, including Kawashima Watkins’ family, were not just there for the hot spring spas.

So after two-plus generations of such degrading treatment, you can’t much blame a few Koreans for angrily lashing out at their oppressors when they had the opportunity for some instant pay-back.

I have here another young girl’s story from that time, one that paints a more accurate picture of Japan’s vicious and dehumanizing rule. It’s told by my good friend Mi-Soo Smith, Ph.D., a former math professor at UH and Chaminade, who was about the same age as Kawashima Watkins when the war ended on Aug. 15, 1945, the day Koreans still call Kwang-Bok Jeul, the Day the Light Returned.

“My father had been the assistant director of the Sugamo train station in Tokyo, but after an American B-29 bomber flew over our house in 1943 we came home to the Daegu area where my mother is from, and he bought an apple orchard. My father thought that area was not likely to be bombed.

“When the war ended, my father wanted to go up to Seoul because he knew the new government could use his experience, but first he went to his home town of Sang-Nam to see his family. The mayor of Sang-Nam had just been kicked out by the people because he was a collaborator with the Japanese, and the people asked my father to become the mayor - everything was in such confusion with the war ending, and he was well respected. He said OK, but only for one week until you can decide on a new full-time mayor, then I have to go up to Seoul.

“On his sixth day (Aug. 24), Japanese navy men came to Sang-Nam - the Americans were still using them (as well as the Japanese army for policing). They came under the pretext that they heard some wells were being poisoned by Korean people. They were fully armed. The next day they came back to take my father. They came to murder him.

“They kidnapped my father, carried him over the mountains to the coast, took him out in a boat, tied him up in heavy chains and threw him overboard in the deepest part of the bay.

“My mother was very angry, she hated the Japanese for killing her husband. I didn’t hate them, but I remember crying, and feeling sorry for the Japanese who did it - they would have to live with that in their hearts for the rest of their lives.”

One can only hope that it gnaws at their souls still.

In my business, I’m entirely opposed to government censorship, so I’m pleased that the state Department of Education did not outright ban So Far from the Bamboo Grove from classrooms and libraries, as some people have called for, but instead provided guidelines for its use.

But I also believe that it would be irresponsible for teachers to use So Far from the Bamboo Grove in the classroom.

If they must, then it’s essential to put it in the context of Japan’s murderous inhumanity toward Korea’s people, history and culture for 36 years, and then to tell the true story of what those Japanese sailors did to young MiSoo’s father.

Mi-Soo’s story is also a cautionary tale for those critical of the Bush administration for dismissing the Iraqi military, police and Baathist Party bureaucrats in the government immediately after the fall of Baghdad. Keeping them on - as the Americans did with Japanese military in Korea - would not necessarily, as critics have contended, have kept Iraq from disintegrating into religious civil war, terrorist breeding ground and general thuggery. And it could just as easily have led to incidents such as this one ...

Finally: Did you see the quote attributed to a senior Air Force official in an AP report last week about electronic/computer problems that F-22 Raptor fighter jets experienced on a test flight from Hickam? “Until you fly the airplane,” he said, “that’s when the rubber hits the road.”

Go figgah ...

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Mr. Common Sense Strikes Again

The state Legislature is one of those places where good intentions go to get twisted into bad ideas, and where responsibility gets shoved onto other people’s doorsteps.

Exhibit A is Senate Bill 1702, which would force stores that sell “HI-5” beverage containers to take back and redeem those containers.

To follow that illogic to its logical conclusion, stores that sell cigarettes should then be forced to take back the used butts - because there are way too many butts tossed on the ground. (Not to give politicians any more bad ideas.)

Herewith is my counter proposal to SB-1702, one requiring less government intervention in commerce, and based on a good deal more common sense:

If legislators believe that recycling is so important, they should take the lead. Show us some serious and true leadership, not dictatorship. Create a system in which recycling is easy and comes naturally - not just for beverage containers, but for mayo and pickle jars, soup and Spam cans, paper products and all of the plastic packaging that seems to come with everything we buy.

It should be curbside recycling, but could be neighborhood redemption centers.

And whatever the big plan, it should include public waste receptacles specifically for recyclable metals, plastics, paper.

There is no question that Hawaii lags far behind other states (and countries such as Korea and Japan) in government-sponsored recycling. I’ve heard visitors remark on how shocked they are that America’s most beautiful state seems so intent on burying itself under a mountain of trash - call it Mauna Opala. (There are always those who argue that just because the Mainland does something, Hawaii doesn’t need to follow. When the subject is recycling and preserving Hawaii’s beauty and quality of life, that argument is cockeyed at best.)

The state certainly has the money to institute real recycling programs - only about 70 percent of HI-5 containers are redeemed, meaning a profit of millions of dollars for the state. And the state has way more available land to build recycling centers than do the stores affected by this bill.

Also, if the half-thought-out program the Legislature originally instituted had been better designed - and performed better - this silly stopgap measure that reeks of punishment would not be necessary.

Although Mayor Hannemann cancelled the city’s planned curbside recycling program in 2005, a basic plan is in place. It’s time for the city and the state, for a change, to actually cooperate on something for the good of Hawaii, its aina and its people.

So I applaud the mayor for trying to restart curbside recycling - even if it means a $10 monthly fee. For what we and our descendants will be getting, that’s a bargain. And I urge City Council Chair Marshall - who represents my Kaneohe neighborhood and for whom I voted - to seriously reconsider her opposition to that plan. The people have spoken: We resoundingly approved a city charter on last November’s ballot mandating curbside recycling. If our politicians aren’t listening, well, I know who I’m not voting for next time.

And in light of the misguided SB-1702, I’m also calling on Gov. Lingle, Senate President Hanabusa and House Speaker Say to work with the counties to give us a sound and comprehensive statewide recycling program that does not place the greatest burden on any one segment of the population, but is inclusive of every home, condominium and business.

To paraphrase the classic line from Jerry Maguire, just show us the leadership ...

Otherwise: It’s unbelievable that the U.S. government is allowing Mexico to possibly extradite Dog Chapman. Cousin or no cousin, he took a serial rapist who intended to rape again off the street. Dog should be receiving grateful presidential citations from both countries, and the Mexican ambassador to Washington should be getting a message from the White House that his country really ought to find something better to do with its prosecutors’ time ...

I cannot see a way to extradite ourselves from Iraq without the help of Iran, as well as other regional neighbors. A recent Newsweek story reported that Iran was instrumental in forging the alliance that put the U.S.-backed Afghan government of Hamid Karzai in place, and that it pledged twice as much money to rebuild Afghanistan as the U.S. did. A week later, President Bush gave his infamous “Axis of Evil” speech, including Iran in a terrible trio with Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and Kim Jung-Il’s North Korea - a sharp slap in the face. Soon after, the Iranians amped up their nuke program. Meanwhile, Iranian diplomats continue to try to talk with the U.S., to no avail. In the real world, the Bush policy of not talking to people he doesn’t like is dangerously naive ...

BTW: I celebrated a birthday earlier this week. Someone asked if it was a “significant” birthday. You bet - at my age, they’re all significant ...

Another friend said: “I hate birthdays!” I say, they beat the heck out of the alternative! ...

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The Sad State Of City Golf Courses

It’s really sad: The lousy condition of some of our municipal golf courses. My son Kai and I played Pali recently and were shocked at the deterioration of the course - big patches of bare dirt in fairways, more large patches of dead grass, including on putting greens. A couple of days earlier I’d played West Loch, and it was nearly as bad as Pali. Both are great layouts with the capacity to be absolute gems - but not with the derelict maintenance they’re receiving ...

Other golfers must be noticing too - every time I drive past Pali, there seem to be few people playing the course, far fewer than in the past. Which means diminished revenue. I’m sure not going back any time soon ...

Weird: President Bush has obviously aged during his six years in Washington, yet VP Cheney seems to look exactly the same as he did on the day they took office. How does he do that? ...

I’ve been amazed by the uproar over news that the U.S. military is giving some attention to operatives of Iran in Iraq. We’ve known for years that Iranian agents and Iranian weapons have been crossing the border to make pilikia in Iraq, so what the heck took us so long to respond? ...

And I hope those in Congress calling for an immediate troop pull-out pay more attention to post-occupation than the Bush administration paid to post-“Mission Accomplished” ...

Bravo to all those working in the Legislature to toughen the law protecting pedestrians in crosswalks. Having been hit a couple of years ago in a crosswalk outside the Hawaii Theatre - in broad daylight by a car turning left onto Pauahi Street from Bethel - I was amazed to learn that a) an injured pedestrian can sue the driver only if medical costs go above $5,000, and that b) I had to report the accident to my car insurance company. So I’m all for forcing drivers to be more responsible and respectful, especially considering the response of the older fellow who hit me - as I lay on the pavement half under his car: “Hey, buddy, I hope you’re not gonna blame me for this!” ...

Sorry to hear of the death of syndicated columnist Molly Ivins, from breast cancer. I often didn’t agree with her liberal opinions (published locally in the Star-Bulletin), but she was fearless and funny - such as her description of a more conservative columnist: “Cal Thomas, one of the great minds of the 15th century ...”

Have you seen our new baby? That would be MidWeek‘s totally revamped weekend paper. New features include associate editor Melissa Moniz’s Music Montage, covering the local music scene; Russell Tanoue’s MW Space, featuring our town’s hottest models (of both genders); a style page from the ladies at Smart magazine; Jerrette Kamaka’s MW Rides, highlighting the coolest tricked out cars, and a new sudoku puzzle, as well as popular holdovers such as complete movie listings and reviews,Yu Shing Ting’s Xposure, Amy Alkon’s Advice Goddess column, Spotted photos, Alison Stewart’s Click Chick tech report, Jo McGarry’s Food For Thought, Kimo Akane’s Kimo’s Vegas, Bobby Curran’s sports column and Gary Kewley’s surf report, plus Kerry Miller’s expanded calendar of events. Filled with photos, it’s a quick, fun weekend read. As Mr. Kewley likes to say: Stoked! ...

BTW: To accommodate the new features, Yu Shing’s On The Move and Roberto Viernes’Vino Sense columns move to the Wednesday paper ...

This is one of my favorite times of the year - both UH baseball and Hawaii Opera Theatre seasons are beginning. Based on the first weekend of games, this seems to be Coach Mike Trapasso’s best squad yet, and we could be cheering into June. As for HOT, I’ve listened to CDs of the three operas, and this could be artistic director Henry Akina’s best season too. He deserves credit for skillfully blending a growing pool of local talent from the UH opera lab with international guest stars. Samson and Delilah concluded to a standing ovation Tuesday evening, and next up is Mozart’s Don Giovanni (Feb. 16, 18, 22) and Puccini’s Madama Butterfly (March 2, 4, 6) ...

For opera recordings, I enjoy and recommend the EMI Classics series - CDs come with a booklet that includes story synopsis and lyrics in English and Italian (French in the case of Samson)...

Did you see the news report about a truck from a Milwaukee TV station - cost with all of its electronics, $250,000 - crashing through thick ice on a lake and sinking? True. And the story the truck’s crew was shooting on the frozen-over lake? A feature on “ice safety” ...

Go figgah ...

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Making A Deal With Politicians

As an independent, here’s my deal with politicians: If I vote for you, I’ll be watching how you perform, and may or may not vote for you next time. It all depends. Thus my vote for Bush in 2000, and for the other guy in ‘04 ...

In light of the Iraq Study Group’s report, here’s my short take on Iraq: The reasons given by the administration for staying - if we leave, the country will devolve into sectarian violence and become a breeding ground for terrorists - have been happening for some time already ...

As for the predicted “regional conflict” if we leave: Iran (Shia) and Saudi Arabia (Sunni) are already heavily involved in the Iraq ground war ...

Fareed Zakaria of Newsweek, one of the most intelligent, independent and insightful reporters anywhere today, put the American quandary best: One day recently U.S. troops bailed out a Shia militia led by Muqtada al-Sadr that was under attack by Sunnis, and the very next day the same Shia militia opened fire on U.S. troops ...

And there’s this: Iraq was a tribal area and never a country until the Brits drew up arbitrary boundary lines - something Winston Churchill considered one of his greatest mistakes ...

On a much lighter note: While comedian Lewis Black was in Hawaii to do concerts in Honolulu and on Maui, I got to play golf twice with him. It started when he told our managing editor Terri Hefner in a cover story interview that he intended to play golf while he was here. (“And you know why I play golf?” he said. “Because I’m f———stupid!” It’s a line with which all golfers can relate.) Anyway, I’ve known concert promoter Greg Azus since we played together on a basketball team (that won a media league championship) more than 20 years ago, and offered to set up some golf for Lewis. We played MidPac CC in Lanikai with Rick Davis of the Davis Entertainment Agency here and Lewis’opening act, comic John Bowman. A couple of days later, it was the King Kamehameha Golf Club (formerly Grand Waikapu) on Maui. Can’t remember ever laughing more during a round of golf than I did on those two days. And there’s no “act” to Lewis’ act - what you see on TV or on stage is the same thing Rick and I experienced on the golf course. You learn a lot about a person during a four-hour round of golf, and I learned that Lewis Black is a genuinely good guy ...

I asked him and John about Michael “Kramer” Richardson’s blowup at an L.A. comedy club.

Bottom line: Richardson is a great comedic actor, but not really a standup comic, and that’s a tough club on the best of nights ...

For more laughs: If you’re of a certain age where you recall the music of Jim Morrison and the Doors, you’ll get a kick out of a very clever Christmas spoof on YouTube by McCrea Adams, a magazine editor in L.A. with whom I sometimes work. You can view his impersonation at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4baSntmh4w ...

With veterans of the Pearl Harbor attack getting together officially for the last time on the 65th anniversary, here’s hoping their descendants, as well as Hawaii’s younger generations, will ensure that 12/7/41 always remains a Day of Infamy ...

Sorry to hear of the passing in California of former Advertiser 3-dot columnist Tom Horton. The list of Honolulu’s former 3-dotters continues to decline - just Eddie Sherman (Author! Author!), George Daacon (living in Florida, the last I heard) and yers truly are left ...

As great as the UH-Oregon State game was - not counting the final score - watching from the upper deck I was most impressed with how truly awful the Aloha Stadium sound system is. So bad, we could not understand a single word that came through the speakers. It was all just audio mush. In this digital age, that’s unacceptable ...

On the plus side, I suppose: The mush was really, really loud ...

Go figgah ...

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Funding Rail, Not Pothole Repair

Unbelievable: With summer long gone and the rainy season nearly upon us, major city and state roads are still in urgent need of patching/repaving. Come the first big rains, the potholes will quickly get bigger, deeper and more dangerous. Kaneohe Bay Drive is so bad, I’d be afraid to drive a motorcycle on it. Walking through my Kaneohe neighborhood, there are a couple of streets where you can sprain an ankle if you’re not paying attention. Kapiolani Boulevard, as a major urban thoroughfare, is a disgrace. Likewise for Ala Wai and Ala Moana. And it’s hard to imagine that the mayor’s and governor’s bones haven’t been rattled while transiting the Punchbowl-Beretania intersection ...

And if we don’t have funds to adequately pave our roads, which obviously we do not, how can we possibly afford to build - and maintain - a multibillion-dollar rail system? I just don’t get that one. Is there a physician who can prescribe some reality pills for the mayor, governor and city council? ...

Conspiracy theory: Maybe our “leaders” are hoping that by letting our roads fall into such dis-repair, we’ll surrender to rail? ...

Then again: Just heard about a Jaguar driver who sued the city because his car was so badly damaged by a pothole ...

There’s good news to pass along: MidWeek columnist Katie Young recently received the Hawaii Psychological Association’s media award. The citation says that her column, The Young View, “explores the hows and whys of life, relationships and other topics often backed up by expert advice from local psychologists. Her column has helped erase the stigma that can sometimes be associated with seeking mental health treatment in Hawaii.” Congratulations, Katie, the award is well-deserved. Thanks for adding to our trophy case, and for making us proud ...

Barack Obama: the Michelle Wie of politics ...

I recently happened upon some wise words from the late Rev. Paul Osumi, whose old columns have been published in book form. It’s amazing how timeless the good rev’s words are: “Many people try to run away from their inner loneliness. They do not know how to be alone. They do anything to escape being alone. They are always on the go; they are always doing something. To live meaningfully, we must master one of the fine arts of life - learning how to be alone without being lonely.” Sound like any cell phone/video game addicts you know? ...

I was saddened to hear of the passing of state statistician Bob Schmitt, but am grateful to have known the man. Back in the days when I was writing a daily column for the Advertiser, he was the instant cure for a slow news day. A call to Bob always produced a fun fact, a surprising statistic and usually a good chuckle. As a guy whose interest (and skill) in math is ridiculously limited (there’s a reason I work with words), I was gratefully impressed at the way Bob somehow turned cold statistics into fascinating stories ...

Go figgah ...

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Advertising-Editorial Differences

More than one reader called or e-mailed about the ad for the Democratic Party of Hawaii on the bottom of last week’s cover.

The indignant gist of all of them was: “I thought you said MidWeek was editorially independent and would not be endorsing candidates or parties?!”

That’s still true. The ad was paid for by the Dems. It was in no way an endorsement on our part.

That new advertising space was created by our sales team, and as you’ve probably already seen it was purchased this week by Republican Gov. Linda Lingle.

How’s that for balance? * Speaking of policies, we are also not running letters to the editor supporting or trashing candidates. We are, however, continuing to publish letters relating to our columnists’comments - such as one this week from an army officer regarding Bob Jones’ comments about Lt. Gov. Duke Aiona.

* Meanwhile, MidWeek continues to grow. In the past month we added Lisa Asato, who had been working for us as a freelance writer, to our office staff. That brings our staff to 13- compared to three when I became editor in December 1994. To say my job description has changed in the past dozen years would be an under-statement.

* And as long as we’re talking shop: In addition to producing two MidWeeks every week, our staff also produces a weekly military paper, Military Oahu Star, weekly community newspapers for Windward and West Oahu, plus community papers for East and Central Oahu. That’s a lot of pages.

* I’m proud to have Attorney General Mark Bennett and McGruff the crime-fighting dog on our cover this week. Twenty years ago, I was a member of the Judiciary Committee that introduced McGruff to Hawaii.

* Otherwise: Here’s the reality for Kim Jong-Il and his nukes: As I was told by a Korean expert at Camp Smith and later by a U.S. Army lieutenant colonel at the DMZ in Korea, Kim understands very well that “he gets one shot and one shot only.” In other words, if he fires a missile at South Korea, Japan or the U.S., we bomb him to smithereens and end his rule. He’s goofy but not suicidal.

* Was anybody else not exactly encouraged to hear that FEMA, the folks who bungled Katrina, were riding to the rescue of earthquake victims on the Big Island?

* The thing that lingers still from the quake is the sound of the groaning Earth.

Fortunately, the fridge was stocked with food and chilled beverages, and there was plenty of charcoal for the grill. Other than missing a couple of ball games, it turned out to be a really good

day. Go figgah.

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You Read It Before Congress Did

* If you my read my three-part series from Korea last year as part of an East-West Center fellowship, you already knew what the U.S. House of Representatives’ Intelligence Committee learned last week from a new report: If North Korea develops a nuclear weapon, it would likely spur South Korea, Taiwan and especially Japan to begin their own nuclear programs. Last week the North said it was moving forward with plans to test a nuclear device.

* To quote Bob Woodward’s new book about the Bush administration’s management of the war in Iraq, Bill O’Reilly and Greta van Susteren of Fox News are in a “State of Denial” about their - and all of cable TV news’ - responsibility in what appears to have been copy-cat murders of school children by non-student intruders. “Does the media have that much power?” said O’Reilly, hosting van Susteren on his show. She added: “We have to report these stories. We can’t ignore them.” Perhaps that’s true, but is it necessary to make these essentially local news stories the major national story of the day? I don’t believe so. Some stories are local - police chases, for example - and should remain that way. When some people with twisted psyches see how much attention is possible by acting out their worst impulses, it may be the final, deciding factor.

* Bottom line: If a school shooting is the biggest news of the day, it says more about media reporting it than it does about what kind of a news day it was.

* Quote of the week, from MidWeek publisher Ron Nagasawa: After learning that I’d served years ago on the state judiciary’s McGruff Committee, which introduced McGruff the Crime-fighting Dog to Hawaii, and having just seen last week’s column regarding my cousin Dog Chapman the bounty hunter, Ron quipped: “Man, what’s with you and all the crime-fighting dogs?”

* I mis-read my own notes last week, and incorrectly reported that all four of the new private golf clubs in the Kona area charge a $250,000 initiation fee. At Ke’olu, the private course at the Hualalai Resort, the fee is $175,000. I apologize for the error.

* Re-doing the math, this means that the people who are members at Hualalai, Kukio and Nanea are only paying $650,000 in golf club memberships.

* By the way, I recently played Ke’olu (a terrific Tom Weiskopf design) with Hualalai’s head pro, John Freitas. A Punahou alum, he’s the son of opera diva Beebe Freitas. When I asked John if he’s a good singer, he just laughed. “No, my mom and sister got all the singing talent. I don’t even sing in the shower.” Go figgah.

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A Special Letter To The Editor

In the last few weeks, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeldtwo of the last three men in America who want to believe the war in Iraq is not only necessary but going well- have claimed that opponents of continued U.S. involvement are not just wrong, but actually “appeasing” the enemy by raising objections to administration policies in Iraq.

If they didn’t occupy two of the most powerful positions in our nation’s government, their fulminations could be dismissed as the deluded ranting of people increasingly unmoored from reality. However, when such comments come from the Vice President of the United States and the U.S. Secretary of Defense, it is incumbent on responsible leaders to speak out in a Truth Offensive.

To begin with, consider who is speaking for the President: the same two who said there were WMD in Iraq, U.S. troops would be welcomed with flowers, Iraq is not a guerilla war, and the insurgency was in its last throes- more than year ago. Their predictive track record alone should make the public skeptical.

More specifically, both men have made three main points to advance their political agenda in the face of the facts on the ground. The first is the scale of the threat posed by al Qaeda, which they have compared to Nazi Germany. The idea that a loosely connected group of individuals motivated by religious fervor, some living in caves in Afghanistan, would be comparable to the threat to the world posed by Nazi Germany - a nation (in 1939) of 80 million people with a large, highly trained, superbly equipped military and enormous industrial capacity motivated by strident nationalism - is historically absurd. And, worse it misses the essential goal of al Qaeda regarding Islam and unbelievers.

Like other terrorist groups before it, al Qaeda is clearly capable of appalling acts of violence against innocent people, but al Qaeda’s object is less to “take over a country” as Dick Cheney warns than to drive out occupiers whom they deem unbelievers. Before 9/11, the Taliban ran Afghanistan, not Osama bin Laden. In Iraq, the people killing our troops are Iraqis or Muslim sympathizers whose affiliation is sectarian in origin. Our occupation is creating this terrorist response. Al Qaeda is the beneficiary by default.

Cheney and Rumsfeld claim that any strategy to get U.S. troops out of the middle of this sectarian war will somehow “embolden” terrorists and be a “defeat” for the United States. This comes from two of the people most responsible for sending U.S. troops into Iraq who now haven’t the slightest idea how to get them out. It is the occupation itself which feeds the insurgency. The only defeat in sight is for the Bush doctrine of pre-emptive war as the first response to political challenges.

No responsible person wants our troops to leave behind a legacy of anarchy or a return to despotism. But U.S. military action at this stage only prevents the Iraqis from determining their own political fate. To date, we have sacrificed the lives of more than 2,600 American men and women and spent almost $500 billion dollars to further the Bush doctrine. The result is that U. S. forces will have to permanently occupy Iraq, like a colony. The American people do not share this appetite for an endless overseas military adventure in Iraq masked as a central element in overcoming terrorism.

Citing terrorism, Cheney and Rumsfeld also assert that administration policies are above question because “the nation is at war;” that dissenting from U.S. policy in Iraq fails to support the Commander in Chief and is therefore unpatriotic. They are wrong. Patriotism requires a full and open discussion about Iraq, and unfortunately, it’s about three and a half years late. A half century ago, legendary news reporter Edward R. Morrow said, “We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. When the loyal opposition dies, I think the soul of America dies with it.”

The truth is the Bush Administration has made no effort beyond accusatory rhetoric to truly mobilize the nation for their war. They have continued to call for more tax cuts while letting our military’s readiness deteriorate. They have repeatedly refused to expand the size of the Army and Marines because it would admit to a devastating underestimate of the troop strength needed to sustain an attack and the subsequent occupation of Iraq. U.S. troops went two full years without adequate body armor and armored Humvees. The administration and Congressional Republicans have consistently resisted any kind of “full mobilization” because it might jeopardize their domestic agenda of tax cuts for the ultra wealthy and shameless corporate welfare.

Simply put, the voluntary military of this nation is at war, but most of the American people are not. And this administration has been completely unwilling to ask for the public sacrifice required to fully support its own misguided policies.

Richard Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld have a clear agenda: frighten the American people by hyping the threat to preclude any rational assessment, and condemn those who oppose them rather than encourage a debate on the wisdom of the deluded path they have chosen for our nation. They seek to avoid any sort of accountability for the profound strategic error of invading and occupying Iraq by blending it with the terrible events of 9/11. They are shamelessly willing to use both the death of innocents on 9/11and the selfless sacrifice of our troops in the years that followed to justify the utter failure of the Bush doctrine.

It was sadly predictable that as the November election nears, the Bush Administration would resort to labeling anyone who opposes their policies as unpatriotic. But references to Nazi Germany and equating dissent on Iraq with the “appeasement” of terrorism are sure signs of the desperate nature of their political failure.

If historical references are in order, I suggest George Orwell’s 1984 may be far more useful. According to Cheney and Rumsfeld “War is Peace”- endless war with an enemy to be named periodically; “Ignorance is Strength”-draw false conclusions, posture false choices and make false connections.

In conflating criticism of the Iraq war with appeasement of Hitler, Mr. Rumsfeld noted we are witnessing “the rising threat of a new type of fascism.” We are indeed! Big Brothers Cheney and Rumsfeld need only look in the mirror to see its face.

Rep. Neil Abercrombie House Armed Services Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces

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Taking Calls For Cousin Dog

Doggone it, the phone has been ringing more often at home since my cousin - or so we think - Duane “Dog” Chapman was arrested last month. I average a call or two a month from Mainland people trying to reach Dog, usually desperately, but there’s been a spike. From the calls and messages I’ve received, there’s a ton of support for him and his colleagues in the Andrew Luster/Mexico extradition case ...

You ask me, there’s money involved - perhaps Andrew Luster’s Max Factor millions used to prompt Mexican officials - among the most corrupt in the world - to move on Dog, and those same officials expecting a bribe from Dog ...

You can see, of course, why President George W. Bush is so chummy with the Mexican government, right? ...

By the way, we were pleased to run a letter of thanks from Dog and his wife Beth in last week’s MidWeek. Our relationship goes back to the day in 2001 when a mutual acquaintance introduced me to Beth, who came to my office and laid out Dog’s amazing story. That led to a cover story by Bill Mossman. Dog and Beth say they still appreciate MidWeek being the first media outlet to take Dog and his bounty hunting work seriously, and to give him some ink ...

I was withholding comment until after the primary election: Was anybody else not surprised that the Advertiser endorsed MidWeek sports columnist Bob Hogue’s opponent in the 2nd Congressional District Republican primary? ...

And, yes, we are rather proud that both Bob and Jerry Coffee, another of our columnists, won their primaries. After suffering a heart attack, Jerry won’t be able to run, but a Coffee-Akaka race would have been very interesting, don’t you think? ...

Glad to report Jerry is getting stronger every day, and we expect to have his and wife Susan Page’s columns back in these pages soon ...

It’s been very gratifying to receive nothing but positive feedback from readers regarding my column spelling out MidWeek‘s policy not to endorse candidates or parties, and to remain editorially independent and neutral. Thank you for your calls and letters of appreciation and support ...

As we enter the start of Hawaii’s cooler months, is anybody else looking ahead and wondering a bit nervously what the rainy season might bring us this time around? ...

I’m certainly no economics whiz, but I do understand leading indicators. Walking through my very middle-class Kaneohe neighborhood (or is that redundant?), in recent weeks I’ve seen five new lawns going in, additions or renovations to six homes, and on curbs old refrigerators, TVs, ACs and computers, and boxes that new stuff came in. Nothing expresses confidence in the future quite like those kinds of investments ...

To paraphrase Jesus: The super rich will always be with us. If you read Roz Makaula’s “Blonde Highlights” column in our Sept. 22 weekend paper, you know I spent a couple of weekends ago at Kona playing golf. And I discovered a new trend in island golf - private golf clubs that cater to Mainland millionaires and billionaires. Four courses in the Kona area charge $250,000 initiation dues. At three of the clubs - Kukio, Hokulia and Hualalai - owning a home at that course is a prerequisite for golf membership. And the cheapest lot - just dirt - currently available costs $2 million. Nanea, developed by Charles Schwab, does not include a real estate component ...

And get this: A number of people have memberships at Nanea, Kukio and Hualalai (plus home Mainland courses). You do the math ...

I’d heard about Kona traffic woes, and experienced them firsthand. On a Friday at 3:30 p.m., it was stop and go from the Kona airport into Kailua-Kona, and all along Ali’i Drive. Good news is that the highway is being widened to four lanes between the airport and town ...

It had been years since I’d been there, but am pleased to report that Huggo’s on the Rocks is still serving great food and ambiance, right on the water ...

David Black, the man who saved the Star-Bulletin in 2001 and purchased MidWeek to make it happen, was in town last week. He stopped by my office and couldn’t stop smiling as we talked about how MidWeek has officially passed the Sunday Advertiser in readership to become the state’s best read publication. David and I agree that our success is entirely because we have such a great staff and contributors - talented and hard-working people who really care about MidWeek. It’s an honor for me to serve as their editor ...

Time flies when you’re getting old: Hard to believe, but December will make 12 years since I replaced Vera Benedek as the editor ...

Harder still to believe is that Oct. 15 makes 27 years since I first came to work in these islands, then so strange and now so much a part of who I am. Go figgah ...

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Why We Don’t Endorse Candidates

Although we’ve been asked to do so by a number of candidates and their supporters, once again MidWeek is not endorsing any political candidates this year.

And as long as I’m the editor, we will not.

I know, I know - there is a long history of American newspapers endorsing candidates on their editorial pages. And in theory there’s probably nothing terribly wrong with it. Although quite frankly, from my perspective, having the backing of a newspaper editorial board may be only slightly more valuable to a candidate than a ringing endorsement from, say, the Moiliili Weed Whackers Association.

It’s the old opinions-are-like-okoles thing - everybody has one.

And while journalists who cover politics are supposed to be highly informed, personal prejudices - for or against - still come into play. Knowing people at both daily papers, which have endorsed candidates, I’m not convinced that their insights or intellect are superior to those of anyone else who pays attention to and thinks about the news. So why should their opinions be superior?

In an informal polling of MidWeek editorial board members after we interviewed U.S. Senate candidates Dan Akaka and Ed Case on consecutive days, there was no overwhelming consensus. Some people liked Dan, some liked Ed. Even if we were taking sides, an endorsement should reflect more than a 4-3 vote of board members. And it should certainly be more than just the editor’s or publisher’s opinion. (Don’t know their inner workings, but the Advertiser went for Akaka, the Star-Bulletin for Case. What does that tell you?)

The greater issue for me here is not showing a bias, either for one candidate or for one party. While our various columnists are free to express their opinions of candidates, MidWeek‘s editorial position is to remain independent and neutral, free of favoritism.

We think it’s our duty to present readers with as many different opinions as possible every week, and come election time to give you insights into candidates for the biggest races - as we did with the Sept. 6 Akaka-Case cover and the Sept. 1 District 2 cover story, and with the Mufi-Duke cover two years ago - presenting their comments side by side. If you’ve read those stories, you know roughly as much about the candidates as we do.

I’ve heard from some readers who appreciate MidWeek‘s refusal to take sides, and hope that you respect our stand too.

A vote is a very personal thing. The only thing that really matters is that you inform yourself as much as possible, and then go out and vote. The word “duty” doesn’t get used much in our modern world outside of the military, but I firmly believe that those of us who daily benefit from living in the land of the free and the home of the brave have an absolute duty to participate in this thing called democracy, at least every couple of years. That means voting, based entirely on facts available to you and your own convictions.

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Cover Story, Hogue, We’re No. 1!

As the editor of MidWeek I want to let readers know up front that I have a personal connection with this week’s cover story by Alice Keesing on Hawaii’s community health centers. I’m a member of the board of directors at the Kalihi-Palama Health Center.

So, like everyone else at KalihiPalama, I’m tremendously proud that Dr. Beatrice Loo of KHPC, one of the three docs on the cover this week, was named among the best dentists in town by Honolulu magazine. A pediatric dentist, she’s a perfect example of the top-rate medical care available at community health centers to anyone, regardless of wealth or insurance.

To be honest, until I was asked to become a member of the Kalihi-Palama board in 2004 and was sent to the National Association of Community Health Centers convention for a week of training later that year (Board Boot Camp, they call it), I was only vaguely aware of the network of Hawaii’s community health centers. Or that they were part of a national network. Today, it’s one of the things in which I strongly believe.

At the core of community health centers, which grew in part out of the civil rights movement of the 1960s, is the idea of “culturally appropriate health care.” Meaning, health and wellness are more than pills and following a doctor’s advice.

With hospitals cutting services to cut costs, the importance of community health centers will only continue to grow. Example: Queen’s is cutting one of its clinics that served the native Hawaiian population of Papakolea. So the Kalihi-Palama board voted last month to expand service outside of Kalihi-Palama to include the folks of Papakolea.

Each of Hawaii’s 13 health centers is unique in its services, but a few facts from Kalihi-Palama may be instructive: Last year we saw more than 90,000 patient visits. In addition to general medicine, we provide vision, dental and psychiatric care, offer a special women, infants and children’s unit that emphasizes prenatal care, and provide health care to the homeless. About 56 percent of our patients do not have health insurance, including many working folks. About 70 percent are at or below the federal poverty level. More than half are immigrants, many of whom came here with pre-existing health conditions. We provide interpreters for 11 different languages, and our staff speaks six more languages. We’re at maximum capacity, and every indicator says that the need will only continue to grow in coming years. As Alice points out in her story, the number of people using the health centers increased 33 percent between 2001 and 2005.

Which is why the KPHC board also voted to begin a capital campaign and build a new, $24 million clinic. (Donations, anyone?)

Please read Alice’s excellent story, and you may agree with me when I say that I hate to think of the mess Hawaii would be in without our health centers and the good work they provide their patients and our community.

I’m an old-school editor - newspapers should report news, not make news. Unfortunately, Quentin Kawananakoa has dragged MidWeek into the 2nd Congressional District Republican primary. At issue for Quentin and his advisers is Bob Hogue continuing to write his sports column while running against Quentin.

The issue came up when Bob first ran for the state Senate. Our policy then was that Bob could continue to write his sports column, but could not stray into political matters or anything that might come up on the Senate floor. He has stuck faithfully to that.

Jerry Coffee, another MidWeek columnist who is running as a Republican for the U.S. Senate, is a different case. He writes primarily about political issues and public policy. Jerry voluntarily chose to not write his column while campaigning, which we would have asked of him in any event, because each of his columns would constitute a campaign speech.

Sadly, Quentin has accused both Bob and MidWeek‘s editors of “unethical” behavior. To me, an heir of the Campbell Estate asking a guy, who works multiple jobs to support his family, to give up a significant portion of his income so that he can run for public office is as petty as it is unethical. The real issue here for me is that our representative democracy requires citizen legislators - regular folks, not just professional politicians and wealthy people who can fund their own campaigns, to run for office. That’s Bob.

“But,” one of Quentin’s people argued in an e-mail to me, “Hogue is known as a sports guy.”

Right, everyone is known for something, Quentin included.

Oh, and thanks to B.J. Reyes of the Star-Bulletin for a well-reported story on this subject last Friday.

I was expecting a call from the Advertiser as well, but either they didn’t deem it newsworthy or they just didn’t want to give MidWeek any free publicity. Can’t blame ‘em - we just passed their Sunday paper in readership, according to SMS research, and are officially the best-read newspaper in Hawaii.

So thank you for reading.

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Targeting Hawaii From North Korea

I’ve been following events on the Korean Peninsula with great interest since visiting South Korea last July on an East-West Center fellowship, so North Korea’s missile launches last week prompted a few observations.

* According to a Japanese newspaper account, the one long-range missile launched, a Taepodong-2, was aimed in the direction of Hawaii. Having reported after my trip that Hawaii (4,600 miles from North Korea) is well within the range of N.K. missiles (up to 9,300 miles), I was shocked that national news reports last week mentioned Alaska, Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles, even Phoenix for cryin’ out loud, as potential targets, without mentioning Hawaii. Huh? Much of the U.S. Pacific Fleet is based at Pearl Harbor, and every other branch of the military is represented here. And RIMPAC happened to be going on last week. You bet Hawaii is a potential target. It’s of limited solace that the Taepodong-2 donged out after just 42 seconds in the air.

* The timing on the Fourth of July was pure Kim Jung-Il. The communists love symbolism anyway, and he’s a master. The N.K. launches took our successful space shuttle launch earlier in the day, as well as Independence Day celebrations, right off the cable news channels. Kim needs attention, and playing brinksmanship always gets it. In Pyongjang, he and his juvenile cronies must have been giggling in their Courvoisier.

* Calls for a pre-emptive strike against the North are idiotic. As I reported last summer, Kim has rockets and missiles - capable of carrying chemical, biological, conventional and possibly nuclear warheads - lined up along the DMZ aimed at Seoul, a city of 11 million people, just 30 miles away. If we attack the North, Kim kills Seoul, heartbeat of the world’s 11th biggest economy. My military sources here and in Korea estimate that if a shooting war started, a minimum 300,000 people would die in the first day. That’s one we don’t want to start.

* Don’t count on China or Russia clamping down on Kim’s antics. While nobody wants a destabilized Korean Peninsula - China especially fears thousands of starving refugees from the North flooding across its border - those two powers don’t mind at all that the U.S. has to worry about N.K. and divert attention and resources to the region. Also, after both China and Russia urged Kim not to fire his missiles, he effectively thumbed his nose at them too.

* Like a bride stood up at the altar, people in South Korea felt jilted by the launches. Which explains why they announced on Friday they’re cutting food aid to the North. The desire in the South for reunification with the North - as expressed in their Sunshine Policy of engaging the North - is government policy born in the hearts of Koreans who passionately yearn to live in a unified nation again. (Although, like the Chinese, the South fears a sudden collapse of Kim’s regime and thousands of refugees flooding across their border.) Preparation for the 6-Party Talks was the big news in South Korea a year ago, but the talks came and went, and absolutely nothing of substance was accomplished. Perhaps now they’ve learned in Seoul that Kim can never be trusted, and that logic, reason and good intentions mean little in dealing with him.

* The 32,500 U.S. military personnel in South Korea continue to act as a deterrent to a ground attack from the North. While Kim is said to have a million-man army, his ability to resupply them for any length of time is highly suspect.

* U.S. air power remains the greatest deterrent against the North’s potential aggression. Military sources here and in Korea say Kim gets “one shot” - if he fires just one missile at targets in South Korea, Japan or the U.S., he and his regime are dead from massive air strikes. He understands that - we think - and likes the perks of being considered a living god.

* So we ought to be at an old-fashioned standoff, mutually deterred. But a threat remains in the eccentric, unpredictable Kim, who seems to love more than anything else in the world jerking the U.S. around. Backed into a corner, there’s no telling what he might try. That’s why we in Hawaii, as well as in West Coast cities, should hope that the U.S. continues to perfect its missile defense systems.

(By the way, the three-part series I wrote following my visit to South Korea is posted at http://www.midweek.com under Editor’ Desk, and remains quite relevant, if I do say so myself.)

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‘Like Disneyland’ For Homeless Kids

Back from a relaxing, stay-at-home vacation. As much as I love to travel, a week of hanging at home, hitting the beach and catching up on some reading is tough to beat ...

Here’s one of the most touching tales I’ve heard in a while. Ms. Ally Choy of the City of Joy Church’s beach ministry in the Nanakuli area organized a ‘round-the-island bus trip for homeless kids and their parents a couple of weekends ago. Most of these kids had never been outside the Leeward side and were thrilled to see Diamond Head, Hanauma Bay, Pali Lookout and Waimea Bay, and by a stop at Matsumoto’s Shave Ice in Haleiwa. “For these kids it was like Disneyland, they were so happy,” says my source, a church member. Says Ally: “The trip opened the eyes and horizons of these children. They had an awesome experience, and gained a greater appreciation for their ‘aina.” ...

Ally says they’d like to do it again in a few months. But renting a bus is not cheap. If you’d like to contribute to the next trip or in other ways - they always need good used clothing - call Ally at 230-9310 ...

How can you fall in love with a horse after watching him on TV for barely two minutes? Dunno, but I sure fell in love with Barbaro as he won the Kentucky Derby. He didn’t just run away from the other 19 horses in the field, he literally bounded down the home stretch, leaving them in his dust. So big, so strong, so fast, so graceful. Like a lot of other people, when I saw him injure himself in the Preakness, I took it personally. First time I recall praying for a horse - other than praying for certain horses on which I had a bets to win, of course…

In a segment last week about Barbaro, was surprised Bill O’Reilly didn’t question a track operator on The Factor who said race horses tend to break lower-leg bones because the bones are so thin: “That’s just the way God made these animals.” No, that’s the way they’ve been bred, for ultimate speed. Which is why they’re called “thoroughbreds.“You don’t see that kind of injury in, say, Clydesdales ...

Kudos to the Navy for replacing its diesel Arizona Memorial boats with clean-fuel boats ...

Did you catch the news item about a Georgia school superintendent accused of embezzling $600,000, which she used for breast implants and a planned campaign for governor? That’s quite a to-do list, isn’t it: Get new boobs, run for governor ...

Go figgah ...

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China And Hawaii’s Sandalwood

News that China just signed a deal with Borneo to clearcut miles and miles of pristine forests - at least 4 million acres - to fuel China’s need for timber reminds me of Hawaii’s experience with China during the monarchy period. Hard to believe now, but the Ko’olau and the mountains of our other islands once grew thick with fragrant sandalwood. Just as in Borneo, Chinese agents came in and signed a deal with the kingdom to harvest and ship sandal-wood to China. The result: About the only sandalwood trees left in Hawaii today are at the former Sandalwood Golf Course on Maui, which recently changed its name to Kahili ...

Why should this matter to us in Hawaii today: According to a New York Times report, this area is known as the “lungs of the world” because forests help counterbalance the greenhouse effect ...

And much of the once nearly endless forests of Asia have already been logged, often illegally. So just as the Earth appears to be heating up, we remove nature’s counterbalance ...

Sobering conclusion: If the 1900s were the “American century,” I can’t help feeling this is the Chinese century, for better or worse ...

Unless it becomes Iran’s century ...

Competition for the Worst Local TV Commercial of the Year is stiff again this year, but it will be tough to beat HMSA’s “You Old Bag.” Shot at Waialae CC, it targets only private country club members, apparently? Or former members of the PGA Tour? The hot plot: When an older gentleman is pulled back to the golf course - by a talking golf bag - to get some exercise, he hits his ball in the water and two young women walk past making rude comments. So failure and insults are supposed to inspire people to get out and active? ...

With the wedding of Dog Chapman and Beth Smith coming up May 20 at Waikoloa, I’ve been asked again recently if the bounty hunter and I are related. Not sure, but we think so. Both Dog and I have Chapman kinfolk in the panhandle of Texas, and there aren’t a lot of people of any name out there ...

You can see the family resemblance, right? ...

Another 15 seconds of fame for Gary Andersen of Honolulu, who last Wednesday had his e-mail read by Bill O’Reilly on The Factor . My old friend Gary was quoting Theodore Roosevelt, who in 1907 said: “In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person’s becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American ... There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn’t an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag ... We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language ... and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people.”

You may also know Gary by his artist’s nom de plume, Cosmio Propellor ...

Mentioned last week that our rotten winter-spring weather seriously cut into my UH baseball season. But so too did the scheduling gurus of the Western Athletic Conference. With the Rainbows’ last two weekend series being played on the Mainland, the season for UH fans ended way prematurely on April 30 ...

I’m not big on conspiracy theories, which some local fans have been arguing about on KKEA, but I do believe in idiot theories ...

So I ask the question again: Is the WAC really the best conference we can play in? ...

I’ve encountered some strange management decisions in my working career - which started at age 9 picking strawberries and green beans in the fields of Oregon’s Willamette Valley - but this one takes the cake. According to a Star-Bulletin wire report, a 53-year-old Fresno woman was awarded $1.7 million because her superviser at a security company spanked her with a paddle in front of other employees - in what was supposed to be a team-building exercise ...

Go figgah ...

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Looking For A Few Good Grumps

Calling all grumps, grouches and sourpusses: I hear that the Aloha Stadium Authority’s Special Sub-Committee To Make Attending Events As Unfun As Possible is looking for new members ...

First up on the agenda at the next meeting: creating more segregated parking areas, making it even harder for friends to tailgate with friends ...

Second up: A ban on yo-yoing in the parking lot ...

As the guy who authored the 1995 book Boys of Winter about the Hawaii Winter Baseball League - and as a guy whose UH baseball season got seriously short-changed by our wet weather - the news that Duane Kurisu is bringing back the winter league is tremendous. If you put all the HWL players who made it to the big leagues on one team, you’d have a pennant contender, starting with Seattle’s Ichiro Suzuki…

With May Day upon us, I have just one question: Wasn’t it, like, New Year’s just the other day? ...

One thing I don’t understand about smokers: If they love their cigarettes so much, why do they toss ‘em into the street or on the sidewalk when they’re done? ...

And why is it that every smoker seems also to be a litterbug? ...

Eh, you got a light? Maybe readers who are smokers can shed some light here ...

Kudos to B.J. Reyes of our cousin publication, the Star-Bulletin. He was just named a Jefferson Fellow at the East-West Center. If he gets half as much out of travelling around Asia I did as an East-West Center Korea Fellow last summer, it will be a great experience. Look forward to his reportage ...

As an independent, seems to me that both conservatives and liberals - especially on a national level -have entirely forgotten what those words really mean. So we have intolerant liberals and conservatives who don’t conserve our country’s (and state’s) natural resources. Go figgah ...

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Feeling Awfully White

Sorry for taking all this recent rain personally, but ... the real reason we need to start seeing more sunshine is that I’m starting to look like a haole! ...

Not that turning into “shark bait” really matters. It’ll be a long time before I’ll be doing my swimming in the ocean ...

Source at Kaiser says they’re seeing patients with infections on the bottoms of their feet - just from walking on the sand at Waikiki and Ala Moana ...

Likewise, vets are treating dogs that ran on the sand and jumped in the water ...

As for the woman surfer with the infected okole: It’s hard to believe an experienced water person wouldn’t know that the ocean gets yucky after any significant rainfall, and after a month it was unfit for man or fish. Which is why, even before the sewer line broke in Waikiki, I disappointed my 11-year-old niece visiting from Oregon by going back on a promise to teach her how to Boogie Board ...

Speaking of the broken sewer line that polluted the Ala Wai: I herewith christen it for the one man who could have prevented it, the Jeremy Harris Memorial Sewage Spill Muckup ...

Could six weeks of heavy rain be related to global warming and changing weather patterns? ...

Bill O’Reilly didn’t mention Hawaii directly on a Factor show last week, but the inference was clearly there when he touted his vacation snorkeling in Jamaica’s “pristine waters” ...

Otherwise, greatest performance by a female vocalist I’ve ever enjoyed: Lani Misalucha with the Society of Seven at Hawaii Theatre. She does it all incredibly well, from Broadway to pop to rock to a Puccini opera aria. The clincher was her total mastery of the difficult Kamehameha Waltz. Seeing Lani and SOS again is almost reason enough to pack the bags for Las Vegas ...

Marching orders: Never trust a country that forces its soldiers to do some variation of the goose-step when marching in formation: Nazi Germany, North Korea, Iran ...

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In Any Language: Enough Rain!

This rain stays mainly a pain: Traditional Hawaiian culture counts more than 40 different terms for rain, ua - from slanting rain, ua hikiki’i, to rainbow-hued rain, uakoko. I went back and checked the definitive PukuiElbert Hawaiian-English Dictionary but couldn’t find one reference for “Rain every #*&@! day for a #*&@! month!” ...

Maybe in its next edition? ... Excessive as the weather seems, it’s nothing new, really. PukuiElbert also offers a variety of terms for thunder, hekili, and lightning, uila. Such as lapa uila, flash of lightning, and ku’i hekili, peal of thunder ...

How wet has it been on the Windward side? A hand-written sign at the Kailua Jack In The Box drive-through lane requests that customers turn off their windshield wipers at the window to prevent workers inside from getting soaked ...

My sister Susan, visiting from Oregon last week, probably spoke for lots of tourists: “Well, I could have been wet and cold at home.” ...

The subject of global warming has come up more than a few times in the past month or so. And a National Public Radio report last week said the world’s oceans could rise by 13 to 20 feet in the next 50 years ...

Taste treat: On the recommendation of the college student son - “You gotta try this, Dad!” - sampled my first frozen grapes. And the boy is right - a very tasty, refreshing, all-natural Popsicle ...

One of the coolest things about fatherhood is learning from your keiki o ka ‘aina ...

Never had the privilege of meeting the late surf photog Jon Mozo before he died in big surf just over a year ago, but did speak with him on the phone a few times, and we published a couple of his pictures. Friends and family will honor him with the first Jon Mozo 5K and 10K walk-run at Turtle Bay on Saturday morning. Appropriately, a small portion of the course crosses the beach. Proceeds go to the Jon Mozo Scholarship fund at BYU-Hawaii. You can register online at http://www.active.com ...

Where did they go dept.: Katie Young fans will be pleased to know that her bum back is improving and she’s due back at work by mid-April ...

And Susan Page has been taking off this month to concentrate on her Heart for Africa and Never Ending Gardens project…

Ridiculous situation: Took the Mainland family, as well as the daughter home from college for spring break, to Pearl Harbor and had to park in a for-pay lot. No problem with the $5 fee, but the attendant had no cash to make change, and no ATM was close by. So I paid $10, while a Mainland couple who had four $1 bills and some $20s left frustrated, angry and muttering about the way our biggest visitor attraction does things. Can’t argue with ‘em on this one ...

But the year-old Pearl Harbor Visitors Center is a welcome addition - especially if you have, as we did, a three-hour wait (those concrete Park Service benches get old on the okole real quick). Kudos to visitor center honcho Patrick Brent ...

Speaking of things naval: Given the former president’s response to the recent electronic spying brouhaha, does anybody else find it just slightly ironic that the Seawolf-class submarine USS Jimmy Carter is tasked with conducting classified missions - which would include, from my understanding of submarine operations, electronic eavesdropping? (That’s based on what Adm. Al Konetzni, then commander of U.S. Pacific submarine forces based at Pearl Harbor, told me during a MidWeek cover story interview.) ...

Here’s an NCAA March Madness matchup made in supermarket tabloid heaven: the second-round matchup between Bradley University and the University of Pittsburgh. Or as CBS’ on-screen scoreboard had the final score in abbreviated form:

Brad - 72
Pitt - 66 ...

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A Welcome Delivery Arrives In Iraq

Readers of our Letters section may recall one from George Orosco in the Feb. 15 issue, requesting that we send MidWeek to local troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Working with the military, publisher Ron Nagasawa made it happen. As I commented at the time in an editor’s note, we were honored by the request and proud to comply. And as you can see from the photo here, MidWeek is now being delivered in Iraq, in this case to Forward Operating Base McHenry in Hawijah. Pictured are George’s son Gerald, a sergeant who calls Pearl City home, and Pvt. Diamond Salsedo of Palolo. Thanks for the photo, guys, and stay safe. We’re happy that you’re enjoying a taste of home in the form of MidWeek twice weekly ...

Waiting in the Will Call line outside the Hawaii Theatre before the Dixie Hummingbirds/Dirty Dozen Brass Band concert, was chatted up by a local woman named C.J., who was peddling the newspaper of the Revolutionary Communist Party USA. I bought one for a buck. Say what you want to about the Communists, but the “all-volunteer political book store” manned by its members, Revolution Books (2626 S. King), is closed on Sundays ...

To honor the Sabbath, we can only presume ...

Why give the Communists a dollar? To find out what they’re saying these days ...

For what it’s worth, I’m also on the Libertarians’ mailing list, among others. Of all the things I love about America, the freedom to speak/publish and hear/read all kinds of ideas is right at the top - just one of the rights that generations of our military, as well as rabble-rousing citizens, have guaranteed ...

Speaking of communism (though Mao would never recognize it as such): Other than food products, have you bought anything recently that wasn’t made in China? ...

If the arrests less than a month apart of two Honolulu men who met teens - a boy and a girl - on the Website MySpace.com doesn’t get parents to talk with their kids about the dangers of posting intimate information for the creeps of the world to see, sheesh, maybe nothing will ...

A post-Larry Price “Katoosh” dinner thought: As popular as sports are in Hawaii, it’s unbelievable that our public schools don’t have broader intermediate school sports programs ...

Not to sound like one of those pushy haoles referred to in our Letters recently, but playing sports on school teams in grades 7-8 back in Salem, Ore., was an important part of my growing-up process ...

But then so were school music programs - which, like athletics, most kids don’t get here until high school. Too bad for them ...

I know, I know - schools are tasked with a lot, especially in this age of No Child Left Behind and so many parents sending kids to school undisciplined and unprepared to learn. And funds are tight (what’s new?). But athletics and music should be part of a well-rounded education ...

Eh, what ever happened to that concept? ...

Breaking news:We were putting this issue to bed Friday evening when Bob Hogue, the good guy who doubles as MidWeek sports columnist and state senator from Kailua, gave me a courtesy call to say he’d pulled papers earlier in the day to run for the District 2 Congressional seat being vacated by Ed Case. I’m guessing polls will find him the most popular candidate in the race. You bet we’re proud of this humble, down-to-earth member of the

MidWeek team, and wish him all the best ...

With Jean-Michel Cousteau in town, was reminded of an incident a few years ago on Maui when Jean-Michel, son of Jacques, was having dinner at one of my pal Lucien Charbonnier’s restaurants. As Jean-Michel looked over the menu, a gecko on the ceiling pooped and it landed with a plop on the menu. The waiter, who also happened to be French, exclaimed: “Ah, nature - eesn’t eet bee-yootee-ful?!” ...

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Toasting Larry With A ‘Katoosh!’

Only at the dinner roasting and toasting Larry Price last week at the Sheraton Waikiki: People clinking beverage glasses and saying “Katoosh!” ...

Congrats to Uncle Larry, who was honored at “The Big Katoosh: Education Through Athletics” banquet, a benefit for the OIA Athletic Foundation, which supports public school athletic programs. Larry is, without doubt, one of the nicest, most bighearted men I’ve ever known, and one of the smartest. We’re proud to say that The Coach is an important member of our MidWeek team ...

Consumer affairs dept.: Our island’s Third World public roads and highways - both city and state - have been great for local tire dealers. Turns out our crummy roads are also good for tire warranty sales. Had to buy four new tires last week, and when the Firestone guy offered a warranty to replace “any tire that’s punctured, or say you hit a big pothole and it pops the tire,” I couldn’t decline ...

Say this one real fast five times: There oughta be an ordinance against dumping old ordnance in our ocean ...

And if you agree, tell your legislators and congressmen ...

Speaking of military matters: As a guy who digs seeing cool planes in the sky, here’s hoping the Hawaii Air Guard’s 199th Fighter Squadron at Hickam gets those 18 stealth F-22A Raptors ...

And I consider myself an environmentalist, but five years for an environmental impact statement at Hickam? The Air Force might have a new fighter jet developed by then ...

It’s absolutely mind-boggling that President Bush, even as he sends young American men and women to die and be maimed in war, is trying to drastically reduce medical benefits for our veterans. Military folks generally serve for considerably less pay than they could earn in the private sector, so it’s the least we can do as a society to offer them good long-term medical care. If you believe as I do that we should “support our troops,” that means when troops become vets, too ...

Duh dept.: The Bush policy doesn’t exactly help military recruiters, either, does it? ...

Kudos to Henry Akina, director of the Hawaii Opera Theatre. Through two of the season’s three operas - Puccini’s Tosca is still to come Friday, Sunday and Tuesday - this already ranks as one of the best seasons ever. Why? In large part because Henry seems to have a brilliant long-range plan: With an assist from the Mae Z. Orvis Lab at UH, build a base of talented - and increasingly experienced - local performers, and mix in top-notch international performers as guest artists. To paraphrase a popular saying about Hawaii, “Lucky we get Henry.” ...

Q: What’s the difference between Korean and the Koran? A: The letter “e” ...

Perhaps now Michelle Wie won’t have to travel so far for golf lessons from David Leadbetter. She’s gone as far as Florida to meet with him, but now the famed golf guru, whose star pupils also include Nick Price and Ernie Els, is opening a golf academy at the Wailea Resort on Maui ...

Bachi in action: Guy coming down Pali Highway townbound in a rain storm rolled down his window to give another driver the one-fingered salute - just as another car drove past in the opposite direction, hitting a river of water and kicking up a huge splash that soaked Mr. Finger Flipper. Made my day, anyway ...

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Becoming A PMSer, Mangos And Myopia

Medical bulletin: Recently experienced my first bout of PMS, and it was not pretty.

(Note: I have some experience with PMS from the traditional guy side of the gender equation, the PMSee, but this was from the other side, the PMSer.)

Not that I’m a modern hormonal marvel. And that whole metrosexual thing is beyond me. But when I torqued my back while doing some lifting, the doc prescribed a muscle relaxer, which shall remain anonymous on account of one of my basic journalism rules: Avoid getting sued by pharmaceutical giants. The tablets - even cutting them up and taking just a quarter tablet a day - made me anxious, edgy, angry, aggressive, depressive, and it was difficult to control my emotions and actions. After describing these symptoms to managing editor Terri Hefner, she quipped: “Sounds to me like you have PMS!” ...

Whoa, so this is what it’s like? Whichever Intelligent Designer is responsible for this malady has a really sick sense of humor ...

The label, BTW, said to take up to a full pill every eight hours. Can’t imagine the mental state that would have put me in. Cujo Syndrome, maybe? Have stayed away from that brain poison since ...

That brief fling with pharmacologically induced PMS is further evidence in behalf of my theory that our personalities are 75 percent brain chemistry ...

Don’t count your mangoes until they’re pickled dept.: Last week’s reference to mango blossoms on trees all over town and a prediction of a bumper crop this spring and summer took a nasty beating on the Windward side during huge rainstorms two days apart. Bye-bye blossoms…

Speaking of the storms: To the neighbor up the hill who lost much of the gravel in a parking area in front of his house, and found it scattered down a couple blocks of road by torrential rain runoff: Mahalo, brother, for coming out the next day and sweeping it all up ...

This may not be the stupidest move ever in sports, but it is the stupidest on the women’s side since Rosie Ruiz tried to get away with the Cliff Notes version of the Boston Marathon: The Ladies Professional Golf Association’s new policy of giving media credentials only to news organizations that sign an agreement allowing the LPGA to use all published photos and stories in any way, and forever, while not permitting those organizations to reprint their own photos ...

Let’s be frank: Even with all the young stars coming up, the LPGA is not exactly the NFL or NASCAR. Discouraging coverage is about as counterproductive as it gets. Kudos to the Star-Bulletin and Associated Press for declining to sign ...

The fatal flaw in the LPGA policy: It runs counter to all laws of copyright ...

And if AP stayed away, newspapers and TV/radio stations across the country would not be receiving any news from the tournament except scores. I’m guessing Hidatoshi Yamamoto, the Japanese businessman who recently bought a Kahala home and sponsored the Fields Open at Ko Olina - with the reasonable expectation of having “Fields” mentioned in every newspaper in the country - had a hand in overturning the myopic LPGA policy last Friday ...

Pidgin and the winter Olympics: I love pidgin because it expresses things so succinctly. Such as the failure of U.S. skiers and skaters to win more medals: “‘At’s why hard.” ...

The Olympics are a reminder that the U.S. of A. is not the only country in the world with a cool national anthem. How can you not like O Canada or the nearly operatic Brothers of Italy? ...

There’s only one anthem, though, that makes my eyes do an impersonation of a supermarket produce section misting machine just about every time I hear it ...

Sorry to hear of the passing of legendary big band leader Del Courtney, whom I had the honor of calling a friend. Supremely talented and creative, Del was also one of the sweetest, most considerate guys I’ve ever had the pleasure to know. (Which raises the question: How did Al Davis ever hire him to start the Oakland Raiders band?!) Guaranteed heaven’s band is really swingin’ now. A one and a two and ...

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Four ‘Most Wanted’ Still Wanted

MidWeek readers have helped identify eight of the 12 criminals who appeared in our Most Wanted cover story last October, says HPD Sgt. Kim Capllonch. That’s good, but we can do better. Capllonch, Crime-Stoppers coordinator, says the four who remain free on the streets are Cher Murillo, 26, 5 ft.; Cynthia Reed, 41, 5 ft. 7 in.; Christopher Villucci, 38, 5 ft. 11 in., and Mark Tanibe, 29, 5 ft. 10 in. Each has been involved in identity theft, plus a mix of drugs, car theft and assaulting a police officer. If you see them, consider them armed and dangerous. Do not approach or attempt to apprehend them, but do call the CrimeStoppers hotline at 955-8300 and leave an anonymous tip ...

Received a few “right on!” and “lead the charge!” calls about my suggestion that Hawaii Democrats draft former first lady Vicky Cayetano to run against Gov. Linda Lingle this year. As a journalist, I can’t get involved in taking sides in any campaign, but this is one that would sure be interesting to cover ...

From all of the blossoms on mango trees from Kaneohe to Kalihi to Kahala, it appears we’ll have a bumper crop come spring and summer ...

Good talk radio riff by Mike Buck on 830AM last week regarding talk of shipping our opala offshore. “It’s culturally wrong,” Mike said, to pass our garbage off on others and even more not to take responsibility by coming up with a realistic long-range plan now…

One reason City Council member Todd Apo’s landfill bill probably won’t fly, says a friend who works in governmental environmental issues: Hawaii is a quarantined state. So if Uncle Joe can’t take mangos from his tree when he flies to the Mainland, how can we ship the mango pits and peels to the Mainland? Ultimately, this looks like a fed issue ...

Intelligent design in action: Our new company cell phones from Nextel come with a battery charger that, when you’re done charging, the cord wraps neatly into a slot in the device. Now that is intelligent design ...

All together now, everyone who has way too many wires, cords and coaxial cables rat-nesting up your life: Doh! Why didn’t I think of that?! ...

Regarding VP Dick Cheney filling a hunting partner with bird shot: As a former outdoor columnist for the San Jose Mercury News, there are reasons I don’t hunt, and this is one. Hunters pop almost as many other hunters in the U.S. every year as they do critters ...

Still, I don’t believe this is the first time the Bush Administration has performed a spot-on imitation of The Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight ...

The GOP, however, could still turn this into a real positive. I know Republicans so ardent, they’d probably line up and pay big bucks to attend a fund-raiser where they, too, could get shot-gunned by the VP - especially if he autographed the wounds with a Sharpie ...

Oh, and had to miss the Olympic curling coverage on radio 1110AM last Wednesday. Did anyone tape it? ... .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

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Tip To Brickwood: Draft Vicky

A little this, a little that, not too much of nothing:

Tip to my old pal Brickwood Galuteria, head of the state Democratic Party: You want to beat Linda Lingle in the fall, you need to draft the only person in Hawaii capable of doing so: Vicky Cayetano. Whether or not she’d be willing to take a pay cut from her booming laundry business to deal with the headaches of state government is the big question ...

But if she does, Brick, I also have an idea for her campaign manager. There’s this guy named Ben, see, and I know he’s been out of action for four years, but still yet ...

Nothing against Gov. Linda Lingle, mind you. But as an independent, I feel free to share strokes of genius with both sides ...

In case you missed it: The family of the men who were shot and killed at Pali Golf Course two years ago - after they drove there and ran onto the course during a car chase and shoot-out - are suing the city. Good call. It’s obviously the city’s fault for not having a security guard at the entrance to frisk armed hoodlums ...

Darn that pro shop, too, for not carrying Callaway’s new Big Bertha bullet-proof vest ...

If they hadn’t pulled into the golf course parking lot just ahead of their pursuers, perhaps the shooting would have occurred on Pali Highway. In which case it would have been the state’s fault ...

Things I’ve seen people doing while driving cars recently: A young woman eating a bowl of spaghetti ... A young mom spanking a kid in the back seat ... A middle-age woman reading a book ... A guy talking on a cell phone with one hand and drinking a soda with the other, while steering with his (I presume) knees ... A woman putting on makeup ... Another woman curling her eyelashes ... A couple screaming at each other ... A young woman slapping her boyfriend ... Another young couple smooching ... A guy with a cigarette in one hand and a burrito in the other (same presumption) ...

I’m not necessarily opposed to a no-drive-and-talk-on-a-cell-phone law, but if the intent is to cut down on careless driving, the problem is way bigger than phones ...

Is there a main boulevard anywhere in the U.S. where road conditions shout “Third World Country!” louder than Kapiolani Boulevard? ...

And has there ever been a worse - as in bumpier - new road than the concrete paving through the Wilson Tunnel townbound? ...

On the positive side, though, they finished the project ahead of schedule ...

Driving to town via Pali Highway the other day, I noticed remnants of the ill-fated rumble strips intended to slow down traffic, and wondered again: What, those state DoT guys thought there weren’t enough bumps in the road already? ...

It’s been fascinating watching construction of the new King Windward Nissan across Luluku Road from my Kaneohe office window during the past six months or so. Lesson learned: If you’re going to work construction, brah, drive something ...

Watching a crew paving the lot was a real eye-opener - especially compared with watching city crews paving streets in Kaneohe. Let’s just say that the commercial guys put somewhat more time and care into their work ...

Unlike this other college football team for which I cheer, the head coach at my alma mater, the University of Oregon, introduced avant garde uniforms and created a new “O” logo, but kept the traditional school colors and nickname - and had to expand the stadium’s seating capacity ...

Of course, unlike this other college football team for which I cheer, my alma mater has had no trouble selling “seat licenses” to fans. You want to play with the big boys, you pay with the big boys ...

Note to Katie Young fans: She’s still with us, but is on medical leave with a bum back. We miss her too ...

Oh, and I think this is a compliment: The daughter, home from college, and I were walking with arms around each other’s shoulders, and she said: “Hey, Dad, you’re harder than you look!”

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Ready To Croak Over Coqui Calls

By this time many of you, especially on the North Shore and the Windward side, have heard the night-piercing, sleep-wrecking mating call of the male coqui frog.

Last week in Hilo, I heard it for the first time. All night long.

And if there’s a guy who needs his beauty sleep, not to mention his function-halfway-intelligently-the-next-day sleep, it’s yers truly.

Even with the door and windows in my room at the Hilo Hawaiian Hotel closed and the curtains pulled, even with the AC cranked up to full throttle (on a night that was already plenty chilly), the ceaseless coqui calls penetrated the room. And my head.

Scientists say the call reaches 90 to 100 decibels, so we’re talking chainsaws and rock concerts here. How the heck can something the size of a quarter make so much noise?! The coqui call makes a mosquito buzzing about your ear seem like a neighborly visit.

Sometime during the night, it occurred to me that the call of the coqui is really nature’s answer to Chinese water-drip torture.

Thus it is that I am calling for a statewide Nuke The Coqui campaign, and hope all decent public servants will get on board and make this a priority. It obviously isn’t for the feds. The Department of Agriculture turned down a $9 million grant proposal to attack the coqui problem earlier in the year. Maybe we should apply through Homeland Security.

OK, not Nuke The Coqui with real nuke-you-ler warheads - but certainly an all-out campaign to eradicate this alien invader. Makes more sense than spending money fighting Waikiki street performers.

To all of the civic, corporate and military groups that do noble things on weekends such as clearing litter from beaches and highways, how about joining the coqui eradication effort? Let’s kill off the coquis and then go back to other service projects. Think of it as a Hawaii version of a Texas rattlesnake hunt, but less dangerous.

I highly recommend the UHManoa College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources’ Website as a source of good, scientific information - www.ctahr.hawaii.edu/coqui - on where to look for coquis, how to capture or kill them with a variety of solutions, and tips for homeowners on eliminating habitats favored by coquis. (The noise was intense enough in my sixth-floor hotel room; I can’t imagine how much louder it would be if they were hiding in plants just outside, say, someone’s bedroom window.)

And make no mistake - the coquis are coming your way, if they’re not there already. The first coqui is believed to have arrived in 1988, probably on the Big Island. Today there are more than 200 infestation colonies on the Big Island; Maui has 40 or more infestations; Oahu five, Kauai one. It may be too late for Hilo, but this is a war that might yet be won on Oahu. An infestation at Wahiawa is believed to be under control, but frogs have been spreading through plant nurseries from Haleiwa to Waimanalo.

To my Puerto Rican friends who consider the coqui their national animal and hold its nocturnal screech semi-sacred, and to all those who litter the Internet with the goofiest spin in the world about how Hawaii is actually improved by the presence of coquis, all I can say is, what on earth are you thinking?

One of these sites even promised to find out which island hotels have the loudest coqui concentrations and to stay only there. Reservations should not prove problematical.

Sadly, these coqui-heads have apparently been seized with Stockholm Syndrome - you know, hostages sympathizing with their kidnappers. Or as the woman at the hotel checkout desk said with a tired shrug of surrender, “You get used to it.”

With earplugs, maybe.

But why would you want to get used to such an unnatural (in Hawaii) racket?

As a native of Oregon, I’m fond of the state animal, the beaver. I’ll bet a bunch of beavers would love to get their teeth around some of Hawaii’s trees. Fortunately, our Thai friends have not made a big deal about importing their national symbol, the elephant.

Coqui-nuts, by the way, miss several points of science and logic. Researchers in Puerto Rico find an average 40 adult frogs per 20-by-20-meter plot, compared to 200 per 20-by-20-meter plot on the Big Island. Why? An utter lack of natural (that word again) predators in Hawaii, such as snakes, tarantulas and scorpions - other examples of God’s creatures I’d rather not see here.

Also, in Puerto Rico female coqui frogs usually lay a clutch of 34-75 eggs, four to six times a year (450 eggs max). In Hawaii, however, mating pairs can produce a clutch every two and a half weeks without a loss of fertility - which adds up to 26 clutches a year, or more than 1,400 eggs per female annually! In other words, without needing to dodge hungry predators, coquis are free to do nothing but eat, screech and fornicate. Forget rabbits when seeking an active sex life simile.

And while there are no coqui predators in the Islands, coquis do pose a threat to Hawaii’s fragile island ecosystem - contrary to the claims of their fans. Coquis have voracious appetites that put Hawaii’s unique insects and spiders at risk, thus also competing with our already endangered native birds and other native fauna that rely on insects for food.

Yes, coquis are absolutely coming to your neighborhood and mine unless we do something to stop their inexorable advance that will not - trust me here - improve your quality of life or the value of your home.

“If you really want to get rid of them,” a neighbor opined, “make a really tasty dish out of them.”

Fantastic idea.

Nuke The Coqui is good, but Cook The Coqui works too.

Coqui croquette, anyone? Coqui cookies?

Next year at Taste of Honolulu, I envision the world’s biggest Coqui Cookoff.

So to the Sam Choys, Roy Yamaguchis and Alan Wongs of Hawaii, here is your civic challenge:

Create a killer coqui dish. Literally.

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The Many Seasons In Hawaii

Our seasons changed last week. At least, they did in my neck of the woods in Kaneohe. Rising for a pre-work walk, I felt a chill. The temperature in the house had dropped all the way to 75 degrees, down from the 78-79 of the past month or so! Outside the air was even cooler, and the wind was brisk. For the first time since March, I pulled on a windbreaker.

OK, so three or four degrees may not seem like much of a season change for people in other climes. And, as it turns out, last week also marked the 26th anniversary of the day that my byline first appeared in a Hawaii newspaper. The seasons were probably changing about that time too, but having just come over from California, this malihini sure didn’t notice it.

Anyway, coming back from that walk I turned on CNN and caught a feature touting Iowa as a great place to retire - cheap cost of living “and some people really want to experience the four seasons.”

If one of those seasons is Snow-Shovels-and-Mukluks, you can have it.

Yup, 26 years later, this former skiing writer has become a total weather wuss. I like warm.

And for those of us in these islands, three or four degrees does indeed constitute a change in seasons. In fact, traditional Hawaiian culture counted 13 different seasons in the 12 months of the lunar year - based on air temperature, wind direction, which fish were biting and what plants were blooming or producing fruit. “When the wiliwili blossoms,” says an old proverb, “the shark bites.”

I say in that season, enjoy the flowers and take a walk on the beach.

My favorite season just might be lychee season. Kona weather season is probably the least fave.

There are vagaries in weather patterns from year to year, of course, but it seems to me that last week’s seasonal cooling came a week or two later than usual.

And in August, I spotted my first golden plover making its return from Alaska a week or so later than usual. Somehow, scientists say, the little birds can sense when winter is approaching, and won’t leave until they detect an imminent freeze.

Hmmm ...

I’ve been doing some reading on the subject of climate change, and scientists say Alaska is definitely getting warmer. Native Alaskans who for centuries depended on thick ice formations over the sea - to hunt polar bear, which in turn are hunting seals - now find that the ice freezes later in the year and melts earlier in the spring. A generation ago the ice regularly froze to 12-14 feet thick. Recently it’s been barely eight. Humans are not the only ones suffering. Polar bears, weighing less than they did a few years ago, are now moving south, often into populated areas, in desperate search of food. And villages along the water are being forced to move because the sea is rising.

Likewise for islanders on some South Pacific atolls.

How much longer before Hawaii’s current shorelines begin taking on water?

Are you ready for some New Orleans-style levees and dikes?

The popular, and I’m coming to believe simplistic, explanation is that the Greenhouse Effect is to blame - humans burning fossil fuels and spewing gases into the air is heating up our atmosphere. I believe that it is in fact happening, and that as India and China become more developed and burn exponentially more gas, oil and coal, the problem will only worsen.

But there seems to be something bigger going on here as well.

Scientists at the respected Scripps Institute of Oceanography at UC-San Diego have discovered what they believe is an 18,000-year weather cycle driven by ocean currents - especially the ability to “vertically mix” sea water; that is, to bring very cold water to the surface. That process, when spread over many years and over large expanses of ocean, cools the air, affecting weather.

And we know in Hawaii that our seasons are driven by the surrounding ocean’s “thermal lag,” the couple of months between the shortest and longest days of the year and the coldest and warmest days of the year.

The Scripps scientists theorize that a natural warming trend began a century ago, picked up speed in the 1970s and should continue for another five centuries. So the Greenhouse Effect is like stepping on the gas in a fast-moving car - global heating will happen faster, and will reach even higher temperatures than nature could have achieved on its own.

As mentioned previously, I like warm. So the later-than-usual drop in autumn temperatures is fine with me. But I hope those scientists are wrong and we don’t end up with 12 months of sizzling summer.

I like my seasons, no matter how subtle their changing.

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As Different As Neighbors Can Be

This is the third of a three-part series based on an East-West Center fellowship and being part of the first Korea-U.S. Journalists’ Exchange Program.

Walking out of the Koreana Hotel on my first day in Seoul, I ran smack into a phalanx of about 200 black-clad riot troops with helmets, shields and big sticks marching down the sidewalk. So I did the only sensible thing and followed them. Which soon put me between about a thousand riot cops and 400 angry demonstrators. I wasn’t sure what they were shouting about — it could have been an anti-U.S. rally for all I knew — but the next morning read in Seoul’s two English-language papers that they were striking hospital workers. Days later they got their deal. “Almost every day there’s a street demonstration in Seoul,” says an official at the U.S. embassy. “It’s how they earned their democracy here. In the 1960s, ’70s and early ’80s, the government cracked down on demonstrators, people were killed or imprisoned and tortured.” During the Gwangju Massacre in May 1980 when students took to the streets to protest the declaration of marshal law by a former general who took over in a coup, 207 people were killed by government forces and nearly 1,000 injured. Students of that generation are called “368s” — in their 30s now, born in the ’60s, students in the ’80s — and are rising to power in government, business and media.

Adds another U.S. official: “Democracy is here big-time now. It’s what we wanted. And democracy is a messy business. It’s very difficult to exaggerate the extent to which South Korea is in a state of flux, especially in their political roles … Very few (demonstrations) have anything to do with the U.S., and if they do they’re typically not a big deal — it’s easy for CNN to fill the screen with 45 people.”

Although the majority of demonstrations only involve lots of shouting, chanting and singing, you see riot cops, young conscripts in black polo shirts, all around Seoul, but especially outside the U.S. embassy and our Army’s Yongsan base. (Yongsan, the huge, historic base that has seen metro Seoul expand and grow around it, is in the process of being closed and the garrison moved from that now very expensive chunk of real estate to south of the city.)

Unsettling as riot cops hanging out on street corners may be at first, they soon become part of the landscape. And the lively democracy — remember the brawl in the National Assembly a couple of years ago? — that requests their presence to keep things civil is far better than conditions north of the DMZ, where only one view is permitted, that of the “Dear Leader” Kim Jung-Il. Across the border from probably the most vibrant democracy in the world today is probably its foulest state, where people have been brainwashed for 60 years, and arrest, torture and murder follow even a hint of protest or questioning thought. And where 2 million to 3 million people have starved to death in recent years while the leadership drive Mercedes, drink Remy Martin and build nukes.

IF NORTH and South Korea were united, they would comprise earth’s most homogenous nation. They speak the same language and share the same family names — if you’re not a Kim, Park or Lee, you’re in the minority. Eight million people in the South have family across the DMZ. Yet no two neighbors are more different than North and South Korea. Perhaps you’ve seen the photo on the Internet of the two countries at night. The South is lit up like a Christmas tree, but with the exception of the capital Pyeongyang, the North lives in the dark (www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/dprk/dprk-dark.htm). South Koreans take pride in being the world’s most “wired” nation, with seemingly every resident of Seoul owning a cell phone that also functions as camera, e-mailer,music player and game console. Text-messaging is rampant. This is the land of Samsung.

Across the border, meanwhile, Kim Jung-Il recently cut about 80 international phone lines, leaving his government (and, thus, the rest of the country) just nine. Less than a year and a half after issuing cell phones, the government recently rounded them up again. Internet is not allowed. The fear, apparently, is as much about information from the North getting out as it is news from the outside world coming in. So South Korean workers who travel daily to Gaeson in the North to build factories in a new “economic zone” are searched for newspapers and cell phones. His paranoia is so great, Kim also recently cut the government’s intranet, preventing agencies from communicating. Korea was historically called the Hermit Kingdom, and the North today is carrying on as the Hermit Dictatorship.

While reunification is the greatest goal in South Korea, people in the South also fear a sudden collapse of the Kim regime. Germany is the model cited, a worthy analogy — except that North Korea is way more backward than communist East Germany was. The cost of eventual reconstruction will be enormous and require years of international support. To avoid forcing the 11th largest economy in the world to suddenly absorb one of the least productive — and one where the people have been taught for decades that the people in the South are devils in cahoots with the evil Americans, and both are intent on attacking and killing everyone in the North — the South’s reunification plan calls for gradual steps, such as the Gaeson economic zone and Gungan Mountain Resort in North Korea.

(While Seoul hopes for longterm improvements in the North, an official at the U.S. embassy said our position is just the opposite: “We’d like an immediate regime change.” Thus another sticking point in U.S.-South Korea relations. But for now, the Bush Administration seems to be giving South Korean diplomacy, and some of our own, a chance.) The South’s phoenix-like rise from the ashes of the Korean War, which left only a couple of buildings standing in Seoul, has rightly been called a miracle. After suffering their own food shortages in post-war years when Korean grandmothers went without meat so children would be better nourished, South Korea is today a veritable breadbasket. Or rice bowl. From the DMZ in the north to Busan in the south, every available inch of tillable soil seems to be used for farming — endless rice paddies mixed with corn, tomato, watermelon and sesame fields, grape, pear and apple orchards, and more. South Korea also ranks No. 4 in U.S. agricultural exports. Life here is good, comfortable, well nourished. Yet across the border, North Koreans continue to starve — the forecast is that this summer’s riceharvest will again come up short of the nation’s need. In large part, this is the result of long-term awful management by the communist government, mixing poor agriculture practices and land management (including widespread deforestation, leading to floods that destroy crops and farmland) with spending millions of dollars on arms. But there’s more to it than just another large-scale failure of communism.

“I don’t think it was a famine alone that killed all those people,” says a U.S. Army officer at Panmunjeom who has spent the past dozen years studying the North’s leadership, “but selected starvation of certain groups. Farmers who agitate for reforms and better conditions have their food taken away and given to someone else more loyal … Kim Jung-Il has created a culture of dependence, on him.” The result of long-term food shortages, says a U.S. embassy official in Seoul, is a people who are “physically and perhaps mentally stunted. It’s a fact that South Koreans are significantly taller and heavier than North Koreans.” Which was obvious at the DMZ, where South soldiers were far bigger and more imposing than those we faced on the North side.

Between starvation, torture and murder, the Army officer adds, Kim Jung-Il “has killed more of his own people than Hitler did.” President Bush OK’d food shipments to North Korea (through the World Food Agency) independent of nuclear talks — “The president is a softie on food issues,” the officer says — and the South sends tons of rice and fertilizer north. Perhaps not too surprisingly, it’s known that some of that same rice, soon after crossing the border, finds its way to North Korean soldiers along the DMZ.

Those loyal to the regime live quite well. “Visit Pyeongyang and you’ll be amazed at the number of Mercedes on the streets,” the officer says.

Adds another official at the U.S. embassy: “One of Kim Jung-Il’s strengths is that his people can’t see the success of the South.”

The North Korean soccer team must surely be in that group of well-nourished loyalists. Their bus was pulling up to the Hotel Spapia in Daejeon (to play in a tournament at the city’s World Cup stadium) just as our bus was leaving, and players from the North were all eyes looking out at the modern, gleaming “Science City” of 1.2 million. If it were China, Japan or Thailand, perhaps they could easier reconcile the obvious bustling success there. It must be tougher to take knowing such prosperity and luxury, not to mention freedom, is being enjoyed by cousins a few miles across the border. It doesn’t take a terribly deep thinker to realize which system best provides for its people.

THE BEST way to understand North Korea, said a Korea expert on the staff of the Commander- U.S. Pacific Command at Camp Smith who briefed me before I left for Korea, is as a “mafia regime.” When I mentioned this to the Army officer at Panmunjeom, he added that it’s a “mafia state that follows an Amway model.” Meaning the guy at the top gets a cut of everything. With no manufacturing and no exports, and with under-producing agriculture and fisheries programs caused by bad management and failure to invest in modern equipment, North Korea is known to traffic in weapons, drugs and humans to generate cash.

“They’re also very good at counterfeiting various currencies,” the Camp Smith officer added. “And because of the nature of some of the nations with which they do business — Syria, Iran, Pakistan — they’re very good at counter-counterfeiting. They don’t trust anybody.”

It is precisely because of the nature of the regimes with which Kim Jung-Il is chummy that U.S. military officers fear that — more than a nuclear attack on Seoul, Tokyo, Honolulu or U.S. West Coast cities — the greatest danger posed by North Korean nukes is that they could end up in the hands of a terrorist and be used in an American city, or against another “Western” target. “South Koreans are not at all concerned about North Korean nukes being used against them,” an embassy official told us. “That goes a long way in explaining their Sunshine Policy toward the North. But we see North Korea nukes as a real threat to the U.S.” Students at Namchong National University in Daejeon with whom we spoke echoed that sentiment. They simply cannot bring themselves to believe the North would ever again attack the South. So the big question for the U.S. — and for Hawaii, which Kim Jung-Il says he can reach with his newest nuke-carrying missiles — remains:Will North Korea ever give up its nuclear weapons and capacity, or stop adding to its arsenal?

In my studied opinion, no. Here’s why:

North Korea has spent 30 years developing its nuclear program. In the eyes of its leadership, nuclear weapons make North Korea an important nation, one that must be respected and feared by other powers. “A big part of the problem,” said the officer an Panmunjeom, “is they believe their own propaganda.”

The U.S. and European powers said nothing about Pakistan acquiring nuclear weapons, and George Bush, on the eve of the Six-Party Talks last month, welcomed India into the league of nuc-u-ler nations. “The North leadership is following the Pakistan example,” the officer said. “We’d like them to follow the Libya example, give up their nukes and enjoy vastly improved relations with the U.S.”

To give up his nuclear weapons and capacity would cause a humiliating loss of “face,” and Kim has lots of face to save. He is a god-like figure to North Koreans, who for decades have been told of his many miraculous accomplishments, such as in his first round of golf making 11 holes in one.

Also, both political hard-liners and those who personally profit from the North’s illegal dealings might make it impossible to pull back even if Kim were inclined to do so.

Ultimately, without nukes North Korea has no other bargaining chips with which to barter economic and diplomatic concessions from other countries, especially South Korea and the U.S.

So, no, he’s not giving them up willingly.

That said, is there hope for the Korean peninsula, and ultimately northeast Asia?

In my opinion, yes. Here’s why: The South’s Sunshine Policy seems to be creating a sense of trust between the two cousins for the first time, and South Korean diplomats have succeeded in getting the Bush Administration to tone down its rhetoric. (The appointment of Chris Hill, former ambassador to Seoul, as the top U.S. negotiator at the Six-Party Talks is also seen as a smart and constructive move by Bush. Or Condi Rice, as the case may be.) China, as North Korea’s major benefactor (it receives 80 percent of its energy from China), can exert influence over the North (although a member of Korea’s National Assembly with whom I spoke said China is afraid of pushing too hard and “losing North Korea”). As an emerging economic powerhouse, China above all else wants stability in Northeast Asia. And if the North doesn’t give up its nukes, Japan could give up its Peace Constitution and begin a nuclear program, a very destabilizing influence and probably the last thing China wants to see in the region — especially with memories of Japan’s aggression that led to World War II still so strong.

While the North regime could last another 60 years, it could also collapse tomorrow (but that’s not something on which to base policy, as the Bush Administration seems to have done earlier).

Ultimately, the U.S. and South Korea can offer Kim Jung-Il all kinds of carrots to give up his nukes, such as the South’s proposal to provide additional electricity for the North, but without the threat of a stick somewhere in the process — hopefully proffered, if it hasn’t been already, at the Six- Party Talks that are scheduled to restart Aug. 29 — he’ll continue to do what he’s been doing for years. Which is, basically, jerk us around. And as mentioned in last week’s column, with his artillery massed along the DMZ and aimed at Seoul, he has an upper hand.

Bottom-line assessment: First, the U.S. and South Korea should sign a peace accord with the North, 52 years after we signed the armistice.

Second, do all we can to support South Korean diplomacy in the region, and hope it works. Third, assume the North will continue to produce nuclear weapons and will have no shortage of would-be buyers.

Fourth, do everything we can short of causing a Korean War II to aggressively prevent North nukes from entering the hands of those who would use them against the U.S. and other allied targets. Fifth, keep them out of the U.S.

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A Soju Toast To South Korea

This is the second in a three part series based on travelling in Korea, thanks to an East-West Center fellowship.

It was after being in South Korea for just a week — and more specifically after just a few shots of soju, a goes-down-easy distilled sweet potato liquor, at a seafood restaurant in Busan — that I announced to our hosts: “I love Korea!”

Back home and not currently under the influence of soju, I do indeed love Korea, and hope to return. What follows are a few traveler’s notes.

It’s only been in recent years that Korea has offered much for tourists — military dictatorships, which ran the country from 1953 until the late ’80s, tend not to encourage the flow of strange people and new ideas. And as the most invaded country in the world — in particular by China to the west and Japan to the east, but also Russia and Mongolia to the north — you can understand a bit of wariness with the outside world.

Among the main attractions I discovered: Seoul is a shopper’s paradise, especially with its huge markets such as Dongdaemun, and districts such as Insadong and Itawewon. And fans of Korean TV soaps and dramas from around Asia and the U.S. are booking trips to meet the stars and watch episodes being taped here.

Although Korea has been influenced in peace and war by China and Japan, Koreans take pride in the distinctness of their culture and the strength of their character. They see the world differently — the ocean to the east is not the Sea of Japan, as the rest of the world calls it, but the East Sea. To the west, it’s not the Yellow Sea, but the West Sea. Their language, too, is unlike any other. Hangeul is believed to be the only world language created by linguistic scholars — following an order from a Joseon Dynasty king in 1440 to create something separate from the Chinese characters they’d been using. Native speakers say “it’s easy, it’s phonetic.”

The people are as spicy as their kimchee. “We’re passionate, emotional,” our superb interpreter Uhm Do Yeon said. “We’re the Latin Americans of Asia.”

It’s seen in the nearly daily street demonstrations in Seoul, a vibrant city of 11 million. On my first day there, I cleverly placed myself between about 1,000 riot cops and several hundred highdecibel striking hospital workers. I saw another side of that passion at a Doosan Bears vs. Samsung Lions baseball game. Each side had four dancing girls on platforms in the stands, drummers, a whistle-blowing cheerleader, disco music and thousands of fans with Thundersticks who knew all of their team’s chants and cheers. It was a nine-inning frenzy, and as much fun as I’ve had at a baseball game. A seat 13 rows up from the field behind first base at Jamsil Stadium cost $5, and the hot dog with fresh-baked bun was one of the best I’ve tasted.

Koreans do food like nobody else. Every restaurant to which the fabulous Do took us included plates and plates of side dishes , banchan. And Koreans kimchee (to verbify a noun) just about anything — all manner of vegetables, even fish. It’s a healthy diet, some broiled meat, lots of veggies, with lettuce, sesame leaves and steamed cabbage used as wraps, plus lots of soups and rice. For every spicy dish, there’s a mild stew, a cup of custard or noodles.

Most restaurants only do a few dishes, but do them very well. A restaurant that features pork will feature a smiling pig cartoon on the sign. A smiling cow indicates a beef restaurant (bulgogi). Others feature noodles. At that bayside seafood restaurant in Busan, we were treated to some of the best sashimi I’ve ever tasted, as well as live octopus that squirmed in the dish (served with sesame oil and seeds, green onion and shoyu). Crunchy, kind of sweet. Then there were the fried

silk worms, which Do purchased from a street vendor. Kind of smokey, crunchy on the outside, soft inside. I had several. These exotic critters were washed down, by the way, with a couple of Hite beers and the aforementioned soju, a clear beverage Koreans have been drinking for 600 years.

The small town of Gyeongjeu in the south is well worth visiting. It’s the ancient capital of the Silla Dynasty, and numerous interesting sites include royal burial mounds and, high on a mountainside, the Seokguram grotto, where at a temple carved into the mountain monks chant before one of the finest Buddhas in Asia. At Gyeongjeu on the east side of the peninsula and on the west at Gongju, the ancient Baekje Dynasty capital, we saw Buddhas with heads chopped off — done when Confucianists took over, a reminder that religious intolerance is not unique to any people, region or faith. Both towns have fantastic National Museums that reveal an advanced culture in Korea for many centuries.

In Seoul, the excellent Korea War Memorial Museum tells the story of all of those invasions and the brave generals and admirals who repelled most of them. The Korean War section is quite compelling, and a stroll outside through the breezeway where America’s war dead are listed state by state may have you reaching for a tissue. Hawaii, by the way, had the highest per capita loss rate.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t time for the Kimchee Field Museum, which documents 200 different kinds of kimchee.

The capital blends modern high-rises and ancient history. The sprawling (and reconstructed) Gyeongbok-gung Palace grounds, just a short walk from my hotel, the Koreana (great location, food and service), was begun by a Joseon Dynasty king in 1394.

South Korea is roughly the size of Indiana, and while you can fly from Seoul to Busan, the 180-mph bullet train only takes a couple of hours and reveals lovely countryside with endless rice paddies and mountain ridges rising beyond. Do not rent a car. Although Koreans drive on the right side of the road, as in other Asian cities driving is an extreme sport. Seoul taxi drivers are quite adept. Leave it to the pros.

And if you want to visit the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), don’t just show up. Only certified tour groups are allowed to bring visitors, and are easy to book through your hotel in Seoul.

North Korea also offers one tourist opportunity for Westerners, the Gungan Mountain Resort. Buses from South Korea cross the DMZ on the eastern side of the country and take visitors to a very remote and controlled resort. Just watch what you say. A young South Korean woman, passing through a guard post on the North side as she returned home, had the temerity to ask a North Korean soldier: “Why is Kim Jung-Il the only fat man in North Korea?”

It only took South Korean officials three days to get her out of jail.

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Living With A Nuclear Neighbor

The smartest thing North Korean dictator Kim Jung- Il ever did — and he’s done far more than most people give him credit for — was to mass his artillery along the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) and aim it at Seoul. This was the opinion expressed by a Korea expert on the staff of the Commander-U.S. Pacific Command at Camp Smith, who briefed me before I left for Korea. After visiting the country, I agree. Those weapons skew everything in discussing the future of the Korean peninsula, one of the world’s true hot spots.

Barely 30 miles south of the DMZ, the South Korean capital is a vibrant city of 11 million, the heartbeat that drives the 11th largest economy in the world. If Kim Jung-Il were to unleash his weapons — conventional as well as chemical and biological — it’s estimated a minimum 300,000 people would die in the first day of a war.

Which explains the gas mask in my room at the Koreana Hotel, and similar masks in Seoul’s subway trains.

Not that anyone in Seoul seriously believes Kim Jung-Il would actually pull the trigger, and the threat certainly does not slow the city’s dynamic commerce, nightlife and shopping — or enthusiasm at the Doosan Bears vs. Samsung Lions baseball game I attended in Seoul. The threat of war is his strength, but an actual attack would lead quickly to his demise, which he seems shrewd enough to understand. And Kim’s foremost goal, experts in South Korea and the U.S. agree, is maintaining his regime, staying in power for at least long enough to perhaps hand over the reins — and this is just conjecture because he has not declared a successor — to his 24- year-old son, of whom little is known except that’s he’s a sports nut.

Nutcase is one of the terms that often come up in discussing the North’s “Dear Leader,” as do madman, wacko and kook. South Korean diplomats, eager not to say anything that would give him an excuse to pull back from recent negotiations, will say off the record only that he is “quirky” and “an unusual leader.”

But he’s an unusual leader who owns a small arsenal of nuclear weapons — actual, not suspected WMDs — that could reach, he says, Honolulu and U.S. West Coast cities. And he has plans to rapidly expand his nuke capacity.

Meanwhile, the Camp Smith source said, the North is already launching daily attacks against America — e-attacks.

“He has some very highly rated hackers,” the Army officer said, “not necessarily based in North Korea, maybe in China, South Korea or Japan. They’re doing their best to get inside our military and government sites, as well as those of corporations and universities to steal research.”

Beyond stealing secrets, he added, the North also tries to infect those systems and crash them.

Perhaps it’s to be expected — we’ve never signed a peace accord, just an armistice, so technically we’re still at war. One of the conclusions to which I came in Korea is that, 52 years after the armistice was signed on Aug. 15, 1953, it would be in the best interests of the U.S. and South Korea to sign a peace treaty with the North and officially end hostilities. Better to deal with the issues of today and move forward. In any event, with the backing of China on North Korea’s northern border, and with all of those artillery shells and missiles poised along the southern border aimed at Seoul, it’s a war we’ll never win in any meaningful sense.

It’s also the destination-Seoul artillery that would probably preclude the U.S. from conducting a surgical strike against the North’s nuclear facilities.

But just probably.

The U.S.’s refusal to declare that option off limits is one of several things that make South Koreans increasingly nervous about their relationship with America.

YOU WILL never find anyone who loves America more, an official at the U.S. embassy in Seoul told us, than South Koreans of post-Korean War generations. It was the U.S. victory over Japan in 1945 that ended that nation’s brutal 35-year occupation of Korea, which included forcing Koreans to speak Japanese and take Japanese names, while Korea’s last crown prince was forcibly moved to Japan and married to a cousin of the emperor. Five years after WWII when soldiers from North Korea stormed across the newly created DMZ, conquered Seoul almost immediately and within weeks drove nearly to the southern port city of Busan (Pusan), it was the U.S. (with 20 United Nations partners) that stepped in to save the South from communist tyranny. By the time an armistice was signed in 1953, 38,000 U.N. troops and been killed, 33,629 of them Americans. Another 105,785 U.S. troops were wounded. More than a million Americans served in the Korean War, and at least that many have pulled duty there since, the American presence offering the greatest deterrent against further military aggression by the North. Without our presence, the miracle of South Korea’s economic and democratic rebirth would never have happened.

But in the ’60s and ’70s, ensuing generations recall, the U.S. looked the other way as Syngman Rhee, who had led the Korean independence movement from Hawaii, and a succession of military generals ran a dictatorship where the torture and murder of dissidents was common.

Today’s university students in South Korea were born after democratic reforms changed the country’s way of life in the late ’80s, have been raised in comfort and take for granted that they live in a prosperous and “wired” society. (South Korea sends more students to study at U.S. universities than any country except China and India, which have 20 times the South’s population.)

And as South Korea has emerged as an economic power, its citizens are demanding a stronger role in its dialogue with the U.S. as well as other nations — starting with their cousins across the border, as well as China, the increasingly powerful neighbor just across the Yellow Sea. At the Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security in Seoul, where we met with a group that included three former ambassadors, they emphasized that the new South Korea expects to be respected as an equal partner.

And though U.S. and South Korean interests ran parallel for decades, they have begun to diverge. While the Bush administration has sounded bellicose in dealing with the North, the South has offered a “Sunshine Policy” — sending food and fertilizer to the North, where 2 million to 3 million people are said to have starved in recent years and cases of cannibalism have been reported. The South is also building an “economic zone” at Gaeson, North Korea, teaching the backward nation about modern manufacturing.

A major tenet of the Sunshine Police is the reunification of the peninsula. Park Chan-Bong of the Reunification Ministry, one of two men we interviewed who would be part of the Six-Party Talks just a couple of days later, spoke softly but strongly, and obviously from the heart, when he said “There is no reason for anyone to oppose reunification” of North and South Koreas. He pointed out that Korea was a unified nation from the year 676 until it was divided roughly along the 38th Parallel by the U.S. and the Soviet Union at the end of World War II in 1945 — unified for over 1,300 years, divided for just 60. So when President Bush included North Korea in his “Axis of Evil,” South Koreans shuddered, and were not surprised when Kim Jung-Il used it as an excuse to ratchet up his nuclear program, as he did again when the U.S. invaded Iraq, sending the message to Kim that his regime could soon be the next to be changed.

“I feel that the Bush administration is trying to control us,” a student at Chungnam National University in Daejeon told us.

Another emphasized that the Korean War was a civil war, caused when the U.S. and Soviets divvied up the peninsula, and turned into an ideological battle when first the U.S./U.N. and later China became involved.

The dozen students with whom we spoke agreed that they do not believe North Korean nukes would ever be used against the South. The concern of the Korea expert at Camp Smith, however, is that North nukes could very well find their way into the hands of terrorists — Kim Jung-Il already has dealings with countries such as Syria, Pakistan and Iran — and end up in the U.S.

Anti-U.S. resentment runs so high with some on the far left in South Korea that there is talk of attacking and tearing down the statue of Gen. Douglas MacArthur on Incheon Island, where he led the shore assault that reclaimed Seoul and turned the Korean War in the South’s favor. Police permanently post dozens of riot cops surrounding our embassy in Seoul, and an armored assault vehicle is parked outside just in case.

That said, even younger South Koreans understand the importance of the U.S.-South Korea alliance. The Chungnam student who felt Bush was controlling her country protested that the 32,500 U.S. military personnel in Korea can get away with murder, literally, citing a recent case in which a U.S. soldier beat a Korean woman to death and another incident in which two soldiers were absolved of running over and killing two Korean girls during a training maneuver. But when I asked if she would like all U.S. troops out of Korea, she answered without hesitation: “No, we are not yet a unified nation.”

DRIVING NORTH out of Seoul with the mighty Han River, broad and muddy as the Mississippi, to our left, green rice paddies to the right, I wonder aloud about the razor wire curling along the top of metal mesh fencing that parallels the river. No, it’s not to keep fishermen away from the river, replies Kim Ji- Hyuk of the Korea Press Foundation, but rather to keep out infiltrators from North Korea. Soon we begin passing sentry booths, where South Korean soldiers armed with automatic rifles stand guard with eyes on the river and the expressway.

Hostile is a good way to begin explaining the atmosphere at the DMZ. Dark, heavy, spooky are others, and we feel it the moment our driver Mr. Lee pulls the van to the side at a security checkpoint. Security at Hawaii’s military bases seems small potatoes compared to precautions here. Then there’s a large poster showing a booted foot stepping on a land mine and detonating it. The writing is in Korean hangeul, but the meaning is clear — don’t venture off the road. Nobody knows the exact number, but a high-ranking officer in the U.N. command, a U.S. Army officer, says 2 million to 3 million land mines still litter the DMZ, two and a half miles wide and stretching 130 miles across the peninsula from sea to sea.

Tension mounts as we drive past sentry posts and tank guards, to prevent the North from storming across and attacking the South again, and fills the air at Panmunjeom, where both sides have headquarters. There’s plenty to be tense about — since the armistice was signed, 92 Americans have been killed in action at the DMZ, 132 wounded. The dead include Capt. Arthur Bonifas, for whom the U.N. command post is named, and 1st. Lt. Mark Barrett, who on Aug. 15, 1976, were attacked by North Korean troops and hacked to death with axes as they attempted to chop down a large yellow poplar tree that blocked line-of-sight between two U.N. guard posts. We visited the site, marked with a plaque and a cement circle the width of that tree. “I visit here fairly regularly,” the Army officer says, “just to remember what these people are like.” (It’s said the ax used in the murders is part of a shrine honoring the attackers on the North side.)

This is the one place where the Cold War remains very much alive.

A few yards away is the Bridge of No Return, across which POWs on both sides were repatriated after the war. The bridge is the Military Demarcation Line, the ultimate boundary. On the other side is a guard post where, our military guide says, “there’s probably a sniper aiming at you right now.” With the Six-Party Talks due to start the next day, I asked, were we at least marginally safer? “Marginally,” he replied. “With these guys, you never know.”

The last Americans to cross the bridge were the captain and crew of the USS Pueblo a year after the Navy spy ship was captured by the North in 1968 — although President Clinton strolled halfway across the bridge during a visit, causing his Secret Service guards’ and several military officers’ blood pressure to rise rather dramatically. “He gets popped,” an Army officer said with a shudder, “it starts World War III.”

We also visited the blue building that sits astride the North- South boundary — the line running down the middle of a long, polished conference table where Military Armistice Commission representatives from both sides still meet. Doors from both North and South lead into the building, and until recently both were kept unlocked. Then a South Korean soldier posted at the door leading to the North was sneak-attacked from behind by North Korean soldiers, who attempted to drag him away. Kicking and fighting, he escaped, but the door now remains locked until it needs to be opened.

Leaving the building, snapping a few photos, we were suddenly confronted by two North Korean soldiers who marched down from their command post and, with boot toes on the line, glared at us for several minutes from just 20 yards away, an obvious attempt at intimidation. “That’s rare, they almost never do that,” the Army officer said. “They must have known this was not the usual tourist group. “The other thing that was unusual is that they both were watching us. Normally, they’ll face each other. That way, if one of them makes a break for it and runs for freedom, the other is supposed to see it immediately and shoot him.”

Unfortunately, there was no time to play Panmunjeom’s 9-hole golf course — “world’s most dangerous,” reads a sign. Slice a ball off the fairway here, you let it go. Beyond the course are more mine fields.

It may be a sign of improving relations between North and South Korea that both sides recently removed propaganda billboards — “Yankee Go Home,” read one — and are in the process of dismantling huge loudspeakers that blasted propaganda messages across the DMZ.

But there is one quite positive note to this wretched but for now necessary place called the DMZ. Against all expectations, it has become an environmental safe haven for many native species of birds, animals and plants that have been threatened in the South by the amazing economic boom and development, and in the North by terrible mismanagement that includes deforestation and subsequent floods.

Hey, maybe every country ought to have a DMZ.

In MidWeek-The Weekend on Friday: Travel notes and tips from Korea.

In MidWeek next week: Is Kim Jung-Il a megalomaniac madman or an astute bargainer? Will he ever give up his nukes? What promise do the Six-Party Talks hold when they restart on Aug. 29?

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Why The World Needs South Korean Diplomacy To Succeed

The following is adapted from a presentation I gave during the colloquium portion of the Korea-U.S. Journalists’ Exchange Program at the East-West Center on August 1.

This being the first-ever Korea-U.S. Journalists’ Exchange, I’m honored to be the first speaker. The importance of the lead-off batter was reinforced when I attended a Doosan Bears vs. Samsung Lions baseball game on my last night in Seoul, and I will do my best to get us off to a good start.

In conducting preparatory research before visiting Korea, I was reminded that point of view is everything, or at least much it. Just look at the varying views and interests of the parties in the current Six-Party Talks — South Korea, North Korea, the U.S., China, Japan and Russia.

Traveling in Korea emphasized for me that point of view is not just an intellectual viewpoint. Rather, the truest sense of the term is the one utilized by screenwriters in scripts, “POV” indicating a camera angle showing a particular character’s perspective from a specific time and place.

Indeed, spending 10 days in Korea with my fellow U.S. Fellows — and I might add that I arrived one day early and ended up between a thousand or so black-clad riot cops and several hundred flag-waving civilians in a street demonstration — certainly changed my POV on several counts.

They include relations between South Korea and North Korea, the topic I’ve been asked by my U.S. colleagues to address today.

Before our visit, my view was very U.S.-centric. No apologies, just the way it is. From the start of the Korean War in 1950 until now, I doubt that you can find many people in the U.S. who have not had a relative, friend, classmate or neighbor serve in Korea. The nation, for many Americans, is a one-degree-of-separation personal issue.

But my POV is also very Hawaii-centric. Our little archipelago suffered more casualties in the Korean War per capita than any other state. Visit Punchbowl, our National Cemetery of the Pacific, and you’ll walk through literally acres of graves marked simply “Unknown — Korea.” More currently, North Korea’s “Dear Leader” Kim Jong-Il has said he can reach Honolulu, along with cities on the U.S. West Coast, with nuclear weapons.

My POV began to change — and I suppose this is what these East-West Center exchange programs are all about — on our first day of interviews in Seoul. Mr. Park Chan-Bong of the Reunification Ministry, one of two men we interviewed who would be part of the Six-Party Talks just a couple of days later, spoke softly but strongly, and obviously from the heart, when he said “There is no reason for anyone to oppose reunification” of North and South Koreas. He pointed out that Korea was a unified nation from the year 676 until it was divided roughly along the 38th Parallel by the U.S. and the Soviet Union at the end of World War II in 1945 — unified for over 1.300 years, divided for just 60.

And it occurred to me then that we know a human parallel to South Korea’s quest for reunification. And she’s sitting right here. Courtnay Peifer, our U.S. colleague, as you may know, and her twin sister were born in Korea and adopted by a Minnesota family as toddlers. Courtnay’s search for her Korean family is that parallel.

It’s a subject on which Courtnay has written eloquently and powerfully. There were times, she says, when they doubted that their search would ever bear fruit.

Park Chan-Bong echoed those sentiments for the nation, I believe, in saying, “When I joined this ministry five years ago, I hoped we’d be further along by now … I try to practice the virtue of patience.”

But Courtnay’s search finally did pay off a couple of years ago, and we were fortunate to visit her family at their farm on Daebu-do (Daebu island) southeast of Seoul. The photo I took of Courtnay and her grandfather is precious, and proof of the contented fulfillment of reunification. My most powerful memory of that day — even more than the wonderfully spicy grilled octopus, kim chee fried rice and noodle soup to which her family treated us, or the tasty homemade wine her aunt makes from homegrown grapes — is the complete joy
that filled the house upon Courtnay’s return.

So this is how I came to see South Korea’s dream of reunification, as a family matter.

And it’s a lovely comparison for South Korea’s reaching out to a bully cousin that has enough weapons lined up along the DMZ — conventional as well as chemical and biological — and aimed at Seoul barely 30 miles away to decimate the city of 11 million hard-working souls in minutes. In fact, in the policy of reunification, I see elements of the three major faiths of South Korea:
• the compassion of Buddha.
• the turn-the-other-cheek attitude of Jesus.
• the absolute respect for family relations of Confucius.

But there’s more to it than good karma, of course.

In the new economic zone at Gaeseon, North Korea, where South Korean businesses use low-cost North Korean labor and introduce modern industry to the Hermit Dictatorship; in the Gungan Mountain Resort, where non-North Koreans can visit North Korea, and in cultural exchanges such as the upcoming Liberation Day (Aug. 15) soccer matches between North and South, and certainly in the South’s offer to provide electricity and food for the North, I see a shrewd pragmatism.

Or as an official at the U.S. embassy in Seoul told us: “The South Koreans have made an economic evaluation of what reunification means.”

Park Chan-Bong affirmed this, speaking of achieving a “positive sum” and convincing younger generations in the South, who have grown up knowing only two Koreas, of the long-term value of reunification (while hopefully avoiding the reunification woes suffered by the former West Germany when the communist East collapsed).

Again, I see Mr. Park’s POV. Eight million people in the South have relatives in the North. Then there are those 1,300 years of unity.
Still, from my red-white-and-blue POV — and this is one shared by many Americans, including high-ranking officers on the staff of the Commander-U.S. Pacific Command at Camp Smith who briefed me before I left for Korea — Korea is offering lots of carrots and no sticks. Or in Buddhist terms, no consequences. I’m reminded of the words of our President Teddy Roosevelt: “Speak softly and carry a big stick.” South Korea is certainly speaking softly — and perhaps most important, with respect — but those riot cops I saw on the streets of Seoul carried far bigger sticks than any offered by the South’s “Sunshine Policy” toward the North.

One place I’d like to see more stick applied is on the issue of North Korea’s many human rights abuses. Just as the U.S. largely ignored the human rights abuses of Singman Rhee, South Korea’s first president who had led the independence movement from Hawaii during Japan’s brutal occupation of Korea from 1910 to ‘45, and the iron-fist military dictators who followed him in ruling South Korea in its early decades, so too is South Korea now ignoring the equally criminal and inhumane abuses committed by Kim Jung-Il’s regime.

The biggest stick, though, must be used to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula.

And it is here that I see a much higher hope for South Korea’s reunification policy:
Diplomacy.
And peace.

A person we can refer to only as a “very high ranking official at the U.S. embassy” told us, “South Koreans are very highly skilled at diplomacy.”

And certainly he’s right — through diplomacy the South has been able to bring Kim Jung-Il back to the bargaining table at the Six-Party Talks.

This has been no easy task in dealing with a neighbor, a cousin, which a Korea expert at Camp Smith refers to as a “mafia regime” for it’s involvement in the trafficking of humans, drugs and arms, and the production of counterfeit currencies (at which it excels).

But South Korea diplomacy has achieved what many thought impossible, not just bringing the North back to the table, but also creating for the first time since 1945 a growing sense of trust on the Korean Peninsula.

Perhaps there’s no greater sign of Korea’s diplomacy potential than the behind-the-scenes work of Park Sun-Won, senior director of the Office of Strategic Planning at the National Security Office. The other gentleman we met who would be part of the Six-Party Talks, he briefed us at the Blue House — South Korea’s White House — press center. Although Mr. Park was too modest to say so, he was the one who, before his Foreign Secretary met with Kim Jong-Il, asked him to urge the North’s dictator to refer to President Bush for the first time as “Mr. Bush.” Similarly, he suggested to President Roh Moo-hyun that during his June visit to Washington he ask Bush and Vice President Cheney to tone down the hawkish axis-of-evil rhetoric. Both Bush and Kim followed through, and thus were both lured back to the Six-Party Talks and — perhaps more important — to bilateral talks behind the scenes.

On such small building blocks can a peace be constructed.

And that is why I think diplomacy could be the greatest export of the “Korean Wave” — far more important than all the Korean TV soaps and dramas, more than all the cool technology of Samsung.

One day, I hope, the world will look back from the perspective of a unified, democratic Korea and remember South Korean diplomacy as one of the positive forces for peace in the early 21st Century. It certainly has that potential — one carrot, one stick, one changed POV at a time.

I hate to think of the consequences of South Korea’s dual Sunshine/Reunification policies not succeeding.

In addition to this presentation I gave on relations between North and South Korea during the colloquium portion of the Korea-U.S. Journalists’ Exchange Program at the East-West Center, a three part series that was published in MidWeek is also posted at www.midweek.com under MidWeek’s Editor in Korea, as are more photos.

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