Letters To The Editor
November 07, 2007 - MidWeek
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Del.icio.usDoggone good idea
I find it interesting that during the week that Dog Chapman is busted for a racist N-word rant, MidWeek publishes a story about a new TV show that will cover Hawaii’s Africa-American community. If Dog really wants to apologize to Hawaii’s black citizens, I suggest he start with Richard Braunskill and Nubian Hawaii News.
Robert Jefferson
Honolulu
Look who’s talking
What is wrong with Michelle Malkin? She advocates ethnic profiling of all Asians who want to donate money to political candidates. Doesn’t she realize that as a Filipino she is Asian too?
Arthur Lee
Aiea
Why EIS is needed
The recent letter from Bill Lovell saying that all the islands are one state is correct, but each island is also its own ecosystem. Mosquitoes did not fly from island to island, they were introduced by bilge water from ships and boats.
Today the possible spread of miconia, now being fought on Maui, is a real threat and can quickly envelop an island. It already happened to Tahiti. What about the possibility that the brown tree snake, which holes up in aircraft wheelwells, gets by inspection at Honolulu Airport? It will quickly spread and easily find its way to the other islands by Superferry. Say goodbye to virtually all bird life, and hello to frequent power outages.
An EIS is done in advance to think these things out, to see if and how potential damage can be mitigated and then determine if the action is still worth the risk. In this case, however, the Legislature meets in special session with the apparent intent of overriding a law which they passed and which the courts upheld.
They should instead meet in special session to immediately get Hawaii onto renewable energy in a serious way. That would create a lot more jobs than the Superferry, get us off foreign oil, develop a sustainable economy and help the environment as well.
Andrew Henry
Mililani
Ferries and whales
I have just returned from a visit to Canada, where I took a delightful ferry ride, two and a half hours from Vancouver to Victoria - right through whale waters. That ferry is going 28 times a day and has been doing that for many years. There are also several other ferries plying the same waters. I also took a waterjet ferry from Victoria to Seattle. It goes at 35 mph, also through whale waters. There are so many of those big creatures around and close to the surface that enterprising businessmen offer whale watching tours.
No one up there ever talks or even thinks about protecting whales from ferries. What makes them so special in our waters?
Stopping a ferry system for whales or making it difficult to operate strikes me as absolutely
obtuse. It is laughable that our supposedly wise state fathers and mothers even permitted themselves to consider special laws for a perfectly normal ferry. What other dull-witted issues may call for special sessions?
Gerhard C. Hamm
Waialae Iki
My dad, the hero
You look at our island and say it’s hot,but out in Iraq it’s 113 degrees, plus our soldiers have to wear all their gear in the hot, burning sun. Over 2,000 of our soldiers have died there. All they’re trying to do is help their country. My dad has gone to Iraq two times, and maybe he’ll have to go a third time. Every time he has gone, it’s like seven months each time without seeing him, and all you can do is hope and pray that he is going to make it safely home, every night hoping he is safe in a country where violence is the way.
You will never understand that feeling in your stomach when you see him getting off that bus and safely home. But then again, it could have been the exact opposite. Like knowing that my dad was never going to come home again, and not having that dad role model around to help you with your homework, tucking you into bed and telling bedtime stories to you when you’re young. Then you have some people out there who don’t understand or don’t even care! But they don’t understand that it’s their duty to protect us, and do their best to help the United States of America and Iraq!
Sometimes it’s hard to comprehend that my dad is in the military, when most of my friends from school and their dads have
never left the island. But my dad still tries his best as my dad and the world’s hero!
Tiare McAllister
Kailua
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