Harris applauds
Cayetano at
Democrat rally
Mayor credits gov
By Rod Thompson
for turning the economy
around and backs his
environmental record
Star-BulletinHILO -- While Gov. Ben Cayetano barely mentioned the state's troubled economy last night, Honolulu Mayor Jeremy Harris gave a strong defense of the governor's performance.
Their comments were made at the traditional Democratic Party Grand Rally, held in Hilo's Mooheau Park.
Cayetano took over the state government "in its darkest hour," Harris said. "These economic problems didn't start four years ago. They started eight years ago.
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PC: DBF, Tabbed Text, Filemaker ZIPSee also the Office of Elections Web site. "He's turning it around. I'm telling you, he turned it around." Without referring by name to Cayetano's Republican opponents, Maui Mayor Linda Lingle and former Honolulu Mayor Frank Fasi, Harris accused them of speaking empty words.
"It's easy to get on the TV and talk about platitudes -- 'we're going to do this and we're going to do that' -- without explaining how you're going to make it happen," he said.
Switching to another focus, Harris also hinted at environmental problems attributed to Lingle's handling of sewage problems on Maui.
"I'm an environmentalist. I'm a marine biologist," he said. When voters look at the credentials of other candidates, they'll realize that Cayetano is the environmental governor, he said.
By contrast, Cayetano briefly mentioned the economy, then went into a history of the Democratic Party's history of fostering racial and social equality.
"Our Republican opponents say they want change," he said. "We Democrats have been giving the United States change since Franklin D. Roosevelt."
"Their party has been against every social program that Democrats have passed that has uplifted the lives of the people of the United States of America," he said.
At the state level, Democrats created mandatory prepaid health care, leasehold conversion laws and replacement of county school systems with a state system that assures equal funding for schools statewide, he said.
If the bulk of those comments were backward-looking, that may have been due in part to the nature of the rally, at which Democrats typically praise their party rather than toot their own horns.
Only later in a radio interview did Cayetano note the arrival of big retailers like Neiman Marcus and Nordstrom as well as high-tech companies and a host of new insurance companies as signs of economic improvement.
In the interview, he also advocated moving University of Hawaii astronomy programs and the College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources from Manoa to Hilo.
HILO -- Gov. Ben Cayetano, noted for a gruff and blunt outward exterior on occasion, got some pointers from fellow Democrats last night on the art of smiling. Dems prod governor
to put on a smileSpeaking at the Democratic Party Grand Rally, state Sen. Wayne Metcalf, who often wears a poker face, got a laugh from the audience with the comment, "I want to rebut the allegation that I don't smile enough."
He added, "Some have even accused the present governor of not smiling enough."
If so, it's an honorable tradition, since the same accusation was leveled at former Govs. John Burns and George Ariyoshi, Metcalf suggested.
Rep. Jerry Chang, noted for a frequent grin, observed that no one would accuse him of that failing.
Rep. Bob Herkes, not overly jovial himself, laid the matter to rest with his own prescription.
Smile at yourself in the mirror the first thing in the morning, he advised the governor. "Then you can get it over with for the day."
