To Our Readers
MARGERY Bronster ticks off the good things the Hawaii Senate accomplished by not confirming her for a second term as Hawaii attorney general: Our crusading AG looks back
She's no longer a member of NAG, the National Association of Attorneys General -- after all, who wants to be a nag?
But the number one, best thing the Senate accomplished in canning her was to show her how good the people of Hawaii felt about the job she did for four and a half years.
"It wasn't all about me," she told an audience of local publishers last week. The overwhelming public rejection of her confirmation defeat convinced her that the public has had enough of elected officials not looking out for the public interest. They want people in government who understand their jobs and know whom they represent, she said.
Would she prefer it if the AG were elected? No, an elected chief law enforcement officer always has to be looking for political support and campaign contributions and that could taint the process. When Hawaii put its constitution together in the 1950s, it adopted the New Jersey model, then thought to be the best. We chose having an AG appointed by the governor "to get politics out of the system," she said.
So much for that theory.
What did she learn from her battle to unseat the Bishop Estate trustees? "All of us in Hawaii should be concerned about not having gotten control of this ourselves," she says. "The Internal Revenue Service's goals aren't the same as ours. Revoking the estate's tax-exempt status would be a terrible thing.
"Whoever is in charge of the Bishop Estate in the future should make sure it never gets so bad that we can't take care of it."
John Flanagan is editor and publisher of the Star-Bulletin.
To reach him call 525-8612, fax to 523-8509, send
e-mail to publisher@starbulletin.com or write to
P.O. Box 3080, Honolulu, Hawaii 96802.