Church burnings may be
caused by faulty wiring

Insurance industry figures reveal that nearly 600 churches burn every year, or nearly two per day. Recent publicity fails to account for this statistical norm and attempts to portray these burnings as racially motivated.

No doubt some have been set afire as a result of the publicity and a "copycat" attitude. No doubt, too, that some are using the fires to further their own political agendas. However, government agencies have been unable to link any of the fires or to find a common cause for them.

Some years ago I participated in a special committee that investigated structural and electrical safety issues at the church where I belong. Among other serious safety problems, we were stunned to discover frayed and loose electrical wiring. Without immediate attention, one of Honolulu's landmark churches could easily have been a fire statistic.

It is likely that small, rural, poor churches are susceptible to a lack of funding to maintain their buildings. Perhaps the "bricks and mortar" folks will convince the "outreach" folks to devote a share of their church's budget to correcting safety hazards.

Janice Pechauer

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Clinton, Dems deserve
thumbs down in November

The Democratic left wing lives on loot. Sky-high taxes and regulatory fees and charges are a necessity to its present and long-range socialist objectives. Its government cannot get bigger without money - tons and tons of it!

So do you blame the Clinton gang when they pile-on the demonizing machinery to discredit the "extreme" Republican Congress?

The House of Representatives is where federal government spending starts. Polls show that less government is preferred by most Americans, and less spending and less waste.

The Republican Congress stopped most Democratic spending bills in their tracks. Consistent with their 1964 campaign promises, GOP congressmen "eliminated 18 transportation programs; 16 energy and water programs; 33 Dept. of the Interior programs; eight labor programs and 47 education programs, among others!" (House Appropriations Committee, July 1996.)

It's also easy to see why the liberal Democrats are frantically trying to bad-mouth Bob Dole's proposed 15 percent tax cut - and that's 15 percent for everybody, not just the "rich."

It is urgently important to dump Clinton and all Democrats in November!

H. Clifford Coleman

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U.S. must be tougher
on North Korean rogues

Regarding the recent North Korean armed intrusion into South Korea in aboard a submarine, your Sept. 20 editorial, "Infiltrators underline threat to Korea peace," concluded in part, "Neither the South Koreans nor the United States can afford to lower their guard . . . until it becomes clear that North Korea has abandoned its belligerent ways."

Would the roguish North Korean communists ever abandon their belligerent ways for good? Only when they learn that such ways would never pay diplomatically, militarily or otherwise.

So what should we do? Keep teaching them lessons on that point. Stop rewarding them for any misconduct. Do not succumb to their divide-and-rule strategies or tactics. Make our carrots and sticks equally visible. Show our punitive teeth and convince them particularly that their renewal of war would be fatal to them.

Cekay Korean Min

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Police chief should quit since
crime has run amok

It is time for a new Honolulu chief of police. Under Michael Nakamura, crime has grown out of control.

Frank Fasi is right: We need a metro squad to show gangs that the police control the streets of Honolulu. We need a police force that can keep the parks open at night so that citizens can stroll safely on the water's edge and enjoy the romantic moonlight.

We need a police force that will aggressively take back the streets and clear them of racers. My wife and I were endangered twice by these racers on the freeway - once in broad daylight and the other at 8:30 p.m.

These racers must have their cars confiscated and destroyed like guns are. The dealers who sell them these cars and who modify them for street racing must be held accountable, just as gun dealers are.

Vernon Okamura