Closing down hospital is wonderful idea

Bravo to Governor Cayetano and Health Director Bruce Anderson for their brilliant idea of closing the Kaneohe State Hospital. The best of all possible uses would be to lease out this site to a private group, such as hospitals or the Salvation Army, to run a drug and alcohol rehabilitation center.

Arrested persons, volunteer entrants and convicted drug felons could then be sent there and rehabilitated. Medicare could help pay for it. This would be so much better than prison time. It would also reduce prison overcrowding and offer some real rehabilitation.

Skip Crawford

Fireworks usage has gotten out of hand

I was born in Hawaii more than 60 years ago. I have seen the fireworks situation go from mild to outrageous.

Irresponsible and intoxicated adults and minors shoot illegal aerial rockets over their neighbors' homes, with no regard to the danger of fires. People have the right to breathe good air and not be drowning in smoke. Neighborhoods across the state looked like battlefields last New Year's.

If religions need to have fireworks, well, then have them do it on their church grounds. Tradition? No way. Hawaiians never had fireworks.

Eugene Simbra
Pearl City

Letting kids play with fireworks is abusive

When it comes to fireworks, isn't it child abuse when kids are seriously injured because parents purchase and allow their children to set off fireworks, knowing that laws prohibit minors from doing so? We are teaching our children that it's OK to break the law -- if you don't get caught or hurt.

We are teaching them to play with matches, litter the land, pollute the air and disturb their neighbors during the nights before and after New Year's Eve. In the end, we are teaching our children to be violent, disrespectful and less community-minded.

Then, when these children grow up, the violent ones create pipebombs, putting everyone in danger.

Gordon Harada
Kaneohe

Quotables "It's getting to the point where we...don't need the governor, the representatives, the senators. I'm talking about a complete sovereign nation." Leina'ala Kalama Heine Kumu hula and judge for the Merrie Monarch Festival On Hawaiian rights and state government "I hate to see people panic. Having two or three weeks' supply of (nonperishable food) is fine, but I've got some people wanting two or three months' worth." Sandii Kamaunu Owner and general manager of military HQ on Sand Island On survivalist-minded islanders stocking up for Y2K

Ignorance of today's youth is appalling

Those of us whose public-school education predates MTV are often appalled at the ignorance of the products of public schools today, not just in Hawaii but nationwide. Examples abound:

Gallup Poll respondents who think "ethnic cleansing" in Kosovo has something to do with required public bathing.
Those who make plurals by adding an apostrophe s instead of just an s, and who never use an apostrophe to indicate one's possessives.
Those who have never heard of the Holocaust and the effect it still has on America's foreign policy.
Those who drop the final consonant in past participles, giving us "renown choir" instead of "renowned choir," "return missionary" instead of "returned missionary," not to mention "shave ice."

Students, watch news and documentaries more, and MTV and sitcoms less. Learn at least one language in your life, preferably your own.

Robert W. Donigan
Makakilo/Kapolei

U.S. should butt out of turmoil in Kosovo

It's about time that America decides being involved in a civil war in Yugoslavia is neither vital to its national interest nor survival.

This world is a veritable "powder keg" with three explosive flash points: 1) North Korea, where we have 35,000 American soldiers on the border; 2) China, which is intimidating Taiwan, which we have pledged to protect; 3) Iraq, which is threatening to take over Mideast oil supplies and to push Israel into the Mediterranean Sea.

Any eruption in these places would strain the military capability of the U.S. while it is bogged down in Yugoslavia.

Also, let's not forget that Russia considers itself a "blood brother" to the Serbs and its tyrannical President Milosevic. Russia has already dispatched six ships to the Adriatic Sea to monitor the situation.

The last thing we should do is send in ground troops. This Kosovo conflict is not worth the life of a single American soldier!

Robert M. Lowe

Democrats have gotten us into wars

The Democrats got us into the Korean War and the Republicans got us out. The Democrats got us into the Vietnam War and the Republicans got us out.

Democrat Bill Clinton got us into the Kosovo war and we may get in even deeper before we get out.

Are the Democrats the party of peace or of war?

Mark Terry

People should consider themselves Americans

Diane Chang was absolutely right in her April 2 column, "The trauma of being Japanese." If more people identified themselves as "American" instead of "Whatever-American," perhaps the prejudices that exist in our society would disappear more rapidly.

Chang was also correct in writing that Tojo's granddaughter's visit to the Arizona Memorial seemed to be a self-serving exercise. The attack on Pearl Harbor represents a high point for the Japanese military.

Tojo's granddaughter did not seem equally as intent on recognizing the USS Missouri and the deck on which the peace agreement was concluded.

Charles P. Hoffman
Weatherly, Pa.
Via the Internet

Unions display their arm-twisting prowess

Is there really any difference between the Teamsters holding Hawaii ransom over "Baywatch" positions and the HGEA holding Hawaii ransom over civil-service positions?

To quote Jayne Mansfield, "Boobs are just boobs!"

Rico Leffanta

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