Don't animals deserve some aloha, too?
I was disgusted as I walked through the brand-name stores at Ala Moana Center recently, because I discovered fur has made a comeback. I'm not one to interfere with people's personal choices, but this is Hawaii. We are usually blessed with warm weather year-round. Although it's getting much more chilly, it still brings no need for real fur. Stores like Fendi and Burberry should quickly retract their products made from the skins of animals.
I would never support the killing of animals for vanity items, and a lot of retail outlets, designers and celebrities share my opinion. Since when are animals mere tools for our pleasure? Fake fur looks just as real, and it doesn't hurt. I think it's time we spread the aloha to our furry friends as well.
Alvin Park
Mililani
Beach park should be open late at night
I was surprised and outraged to find out that Ala Moana Beach Park is closed 10 p.m.-4 a.m. nightly. I live right downtown. My son and I have met tourists, regulars and other families there. They would get to look for sand crabs, play, explore, lie on the sand and look at the stars, enjoy the fishers and check out their catch. It was convenient for us to enjoy our natural paradise -- what's left of it for us city dwellers.
The Mayor's Office suggested parking outside the park. Is the park open? Where would we put our cars? I didn't feel threatened by the homeless people living at the park. They just wanted to sleep and wanted it quiet, too. I just wanted my car parked nearby under a light pole, my cell phone and the joggers, lovers, religious groups and moonlight picnics.
Let's find a balance. Can we get police or citizen patrols or a security check-in within the park? I'm willing to show my ID to use the park at night. Would it at least be possible to open the park until midnight on weekends and holidays?
Sandra Y.W. Chun
Honolulu
Other sources of lethal fumes are killing us
This secondhand-smoke hysteria is just a smoke screen for something far more lethal, more sinister.
We can kill ourselves in 20 minutes by inhaling fumes from one car. But we don't worry about the megatons of car and jet exhaust that we spew into the environment daily. We're told, "It will blow away." To where? We only have one atmosphere, so where do we imagine those lethal fumes will go? To China? Into our ocean? Onto our land?
Our oceans are full of our exhaust particles; our land, our soil is covered though we might not see it with our eyes. It's destroying our brains, our nervous systems, giving us cancer; we're polluting ourselves out of existence. Do we care? Oh no, we're busy wafting away secondhand smoke. That in itself appears to be evidence of our brains being affected by lethal fumes.
Rosemarie Tucker
Honolulu
Tsunami a real threat after Kuril quake
Your
Nov. 16 article about the tsunami surge in Hawaii was brought to my attention here in California, where I now reside after retiring as director of the International Tsunami Information Center.
The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center and the Hawaii emergency management system indeed should be commended for their action regarding the tsunami originating in the Kuril Islands. Tsunami surge at sites far from the source area is not unusual. A magnitude-8 earthquake in Chile in 1995 created a surge in the Marquesas Islands that swamped a boat moored in a harbor. Mayor Harry Kim, then the Big Island Civil Defense director, reported to me that a significant surge was observed in the Hilo small-boat harbor from that same earthquake. I personally observed a surge of about 18 inches' height in the channelized Nuuanu Stream below Vineyard Boulevard following a magnitude-8.4 earthquake in Peru in 2001.
Michael Blackford
San Ramon, Calif.
Drunk-driving death stats do not add up
Your
Dec. 1 article "Drinking's deadly toll" was poorly researched and written. "Hawaii was the deadliest state when it came to traffic fatalities in 2005 involving alcohol use, according to a national traffic safety advocacy group," the article proclaimed in its first paragraph.
Not according to Mothers Against Drunk Driving's Web site. In terms of actual number of deaths, Hawaii ranks in the bottom 10. In terms of per capita, Hawaii ranks in the bottom 20.
The group End Needless Deaths on Our Roadways' Web site also betrays its poor math skills. Its "2006 Fatal Fifteen" news release boldly proclaims that the 15 worst states are responsible for more than 4,300 of the nation's nearly 17,000 alcohol-related traffic deaths.
You mean the worst 29 percent of the states are responsible for only 25 percent of the nation's deaths? END is obviously focusing on the wrong 15 states.
David Lusk
Waianae
Closing AIDS unit an unneeded tragedy
Thank you for your
Nov. 30 editorial strongly supporting the Hawaii AIDS Clinical Trials Unit. It would be tragically shortsighted to
close this valuable, respected and effective program for the sake of saving such a tiny percentage of the federal budget. That $2 million is equal to what is spent on the Iraq war in about 20 minutes, or in a week's worth of overcharging on no-bid contracts by Halliburton.
As someone who participates in these trials, I know how much they help those who are in them now and those who will benefit in the future from the research. As someone who has lost too many friends to AIDS, I know how important the hope they offer is for better treatments and for a cure someday.
I urge everyone to contact U.S. Sens. Daniel Inouye and Daniel Akaka, and Congressmen Neil Abercrombie and Ed Case to try to restore federal funding for HACTU.
Tom Sheeran
Honolulu
Games will be on TV when Warriors step up
In response to one of your readers who inquired as to why University of Hawaii football games are not televised on the mainland, the reason is fairly simple. Games televised here in Southern California during prime time are those that feature teams that are contending in major conferences. It is tough to crack the lineup, which features elite teams such as the University of Southern California and others in the PAC-10 conference.
It was also mentioned earlier in a letter to the editor that major teams comes to Hawaii to get a win under their belt. That is not necessarily the case. The reason for those major teams going to Hawaii is because UH makes it lucrative enough for them to go there, and the reward to UH is that it will fill the stands, as the case when USC arrives in town and recently when Purdue made its trip there. Purdue might not have won, but it pretty much filled the stands at Aloha Stadium. Remember, the last sellout was when USC played there.
I do agree with your reader who said that UH needs to get out of the Western Athletic Conference and play higher-caliber teams. Settling for a yearly appearance in the Hawaii Bowl is no great payday compared with what the Bowl Championship Series bowl games pay! UH needs to recruit more talented players before they can reach the level of those playing in the BCS bowl games. They need to gear themselves up as a major independent, just as Notre Dame has, and they really need to play and win against "quality" teams. But to do that, UH must also offer these quality teams some form of compensation for even considering to put them on their schedule.
Herman Young
Long Beach, Calif.
Symphony offers youths fun, discipline
Thank you for writing about the Hawaii Youth Symphony (
Star-Bulletin, Nov. 28)! I was delighted to see a picture of director Henry Miyamura, looking exactly as I remember him, giving us downbeats 20 years ago.
Yes, that's right, I was in the youth symphony, playing oboe, 20 years ago, a product of Kailua High School's excellent band program run by Norman Baltazar. I still have the oboe, although it hasn't given a tuning A to a first violin in a long time now.
But what I do have is the musical knowledge and pride that comes from playing in a symphonic group. There is nothing quite like learning about classical music from inside an orchestra. We were not sitting in plush seats in the audience listening to the abstraction of beautiful music. We were working, dealing with the sheer physicality of powering an instrument, internalizing tempo and rhythm, being responsible for learning our parts and, of course, watching and listening to Mr. Miyamura ... all this while getting spit on the floor from the instruments, trying to keep track of our sheet music and remembering to bring a pencil to rehearsal, and transporting large instruments -- and being teenagers.
I remember the drama -- will the woodwinds remain in tune during this part we had trouble with in rehearsal? There was intrigue -- who will get first chair this year? And fun -- good heavens! Are the lower brass players actually singing along with the "Messiah"?
I still listen to recordings of works we played during my time with the group, especially Brahms' First Symphony. I wait for specific measures, and when they arrive, they bring back memories of skinny, shy kids who would try every week to leave their awkwardness behind to bring the beauty of a master composer to life, under the guidance and love of a dedicated, gifted and kind man.
Pamela Tao
San Francisco
Foster care funding is in need of reform
The article "State struggles to place teens in foster care" (
Star-Bulletin, Nov. 20) raised a number of issues that face our foster care system. The article focused on the importance of finding safe, permanent, loving families for children in foster care, and the difficulty of doing so for older youths. The odds are against youths who "age out" of foster care at age 18 without finding a permanent family. Research has shown that many become homeless, unemployed or incarcerated within two years of leaving foster care; many suffer from physical or mental illnesses; only one in 10 will graduate from college.
Your article mentioned a number of innovative programs that Hawaii is using to remedy this problem. It also underscored the importance of being able to use federal foster-care dollars more flexibly to better meet the needs of children and struggling families, thereby enabling families to remain intact. Currently, federal foster-care dollars are largely restricted to supporting children and families only when children are removed from their home and placed in formal foster care, rather than on preventing placement in foster care.
Reforming federal funding, as recommended by the national, nonpartisan Pew Commission on Children in Foster Care, would ensure that states could use federal funds to provide preventive supports and services to keep families together, keep children out of foster care or make certain that they spend less time in foster care before joining permanent families. These supports could include rent subsidies, drug treatment, family counseling, subsidies for grandparents or other relatives who care for children, and post-adoption support.
Hawaii's great work is to be commended, but more must be done on behalf of our most vulnerable children. Our entire nation needs to follow the path Hawaii is charting and step up on behalf of the 500,000 children in our care.
Miriam Krinsky
Executive director
Home At Last
Monterey Park, Calif.
Rail can be friendly to walkers and bikes
I ride a bicycle from Kailua to downtown every morning and bus back to Kailua every evening. I support rail transit and am willing to pay for it even if it will not directly affect my commute.
Rail transit is necessary for the island as a whole and is an integral part of making Honolulu pedestrian- and bike-friendly and more livable. I expect that convenient, safe routes for pedestrians and cyclists to get to transit stops will be developed. Transit cars should carry bicycles during all operating hours, and bicycle parking must be available at transit stops. I support City Council Bill 79 to move forward on rail transit now! I am a member of the Hawaii Bicycling League, which supported the pedestrian- and bicycle-friendly City Charter amendment passed by 75 percent of voters.
Chad Taniguchi
Kailua
Readers, tell us about 2007
THE tick of the clock from December 2006's last second to January 2007's first is really no different from any other. Nonetheless, it marks a turn of time regarded as a genesis -- a beginning.
The Star-Bulletin would like readers to submit their thoughts, ideas and hopes for 2007. Tell us what you would like the year to bring or what you expect 2007 will be like. Feel free to get the family involved -- we'd like to hear from our younger readers, too. And you're welcome to express your feelings in a photograph or drawing rather than words, if you prefer.
Comments and observations may be personal or global, material or spiritual -- whatever is on your mind. We will publish your words on New Year's Day, along with some photos and other artwork you send.
E-mail us at newyear@starbulletin.com, or send mail to Editorial Department, Star-Bulletin, 7 Waterfront Plaza, 500 Ala Moana, Suite 210, Honolulu, HI, 96813.
We look forward to hearing from you.
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