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Letters
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Saturday, September 2, 2000

Final edition had real news about SATs

On Tuesday morning, Aug. 29, the state Department of Education had the honor of releasing news of Hawaii's best College Board SAT scores in several years. The national and state data became available at 6 a.m., and your reporter must have checked the College Board Web site to rush a story into your first edition under the front-page headline, "Isle students still lag in verbal skills."

What a shock to read such a negative perspective after Hawaii's SAT scores had a six-point surge in both math and verbal, placing the math scores even higher above the national average and narrowing the gap toward the national verbal average. And Hawaii had made this significant progress in verbal scores even while national scores had remained static for five years.

"Gee," I thought, "some people see the glass half full while some see it half empty."

I carried that thought with me all day until getting home at 11 p.m., when I picked up our home-delivered final edition of the Star-Bulletin. What a delightful surprise! Your later edition had been changed to trumpet a new front-page headline, "Isle SAT scores best since '80s," followed with a substantial rewrite of the story to accentuate the positive.

When I studied journalism, news was defined as "Man Bites Dog," not "Dog Bites Man." The point that our verbal scores remain under the national average is not news; the fact that we're making progress in the right direction is news to celebrate.

I'm glad you took a second look and saw that the glass was half full and rising. My cup runneth over in appreciation and respect.

Greg Knudsen
Communications Director
Hawaii Department of Education

Puna golf project raises questions

The state isn't going to help the residents of lower Puna develop any additional water resources. So how could Sen. David Matsuura and his friends from Japan expect to put a golf resort in this isolated area without the necessary water (Star-Bulletin, Aug. 25)?

Oh, what a coincidence. Just a couple of years ago, the state ran a big trunk line down to that exact spot. That's really lucky for the senator, don't you think?

Greg Henkel
Pahoa, Hawaii

Values of Scouting are being lost

Thank you for John Flanagan's Aug. 26 column on the Boy Scouts. He said it very well. Scouting has instilled in me a love of nature and of camping and hiking, among many other things.

I had the honor of serving in the Scout Camp of the 1939 New York World's Fair, and achieved the rank of Eagle Scout. Back then, the word "straight" didn't have the connotation it has today, and I never heard the word "homosexual." People were judged by their knowledge and skills and leadership.

I'm sad that today's youth may be deprived of the opportunities that Flanagan and I and millions of other boys experienced in our innocence and trust. I fear that the movement may die from the misguided leadership that now is pushing it to self-destruction.

Walter R. Steiger
Hilo

Teen prostitution is blight on community

Last week's "Girls for sale" series -- about how female teens are abused by society's predators -- alarmed and hurt me. Such conditions cannot be allowed to continue without dire consequence for our community as a whole.

Do we really believe that the affluent and privileged (both adults and children) are somehow immune from our most vulnerable and persons in pain? How many more shootings, violent crimes, suicides and other desperate expressions of "lack of coping skills" do we need to recognize that we are all interconnected as an ohana?

David Miho

Well-meaning haole will destroy Hawaiians

I read with sadness but no real surprise of Kenneth Conklin, a retired Boston school teacher, and his decision to run for the Office of Hawaiian Affairs board of trustees. His actions reveal him to be another purportedly well-intentioned haole whose misguided sense of place in the world prompts him to intrude into the affairs of another culture.

Conklin's excuse is that his interest in and knowledge of Hawaiian history, traditions and language somehow make him eligible for this role. The end result, however, is both insulting and insensitive to the very people he claims to be so keen to help.

He could have instead chosen the admittedly more humble and low-profile way of assisting indigenous Hawaiian aspirations by first asking how he might best contribute to the cause.

To usurp the rightful role of native peoples to represent themselves is the worst form of cultural misappropriation. If unchecked, it can lead to the extinguishment of that culture.

At a time when so much attention is being focused on the preservation of biological diversity, how can an educated person like Conklin fail to appreciate that his actions are contributing to native Hawaiian cultural genocide?

I suggest he and other well-meaning haoles direct their energies into learning the historical lessons of the shameful treatment of Hawaiians by the U.S. government, and then making sure that they themselves do not repeat it.

Mere Roberts

Non-Hawaiians love this planet, too

In a Aug. 25 letter headlined, "Non-Hawaiians aren't qualified to run OHA," Ululani Po'ohina asks if non-Hawaiians can conceive the thought of "malama pono i ka honua" or to "take great care of the Earth, its waters, creatures and atmosphere."

The answer is yes, absolutely. There are non-Hawaiians who cannot only conceive this thought, but who take responsibility for protecting the Earth without anger, whining or complaining.

William Mistele

Hawaiians benefit from being U.S. citizens

Hawaiians need a reality check. They should be happy to be citizens of the United States, with all the benefits they derive.

A nation of Hawaii will never happen. The times of the alii are over, like the times of the emperors are over in Europe.

It seems that only a few Hawaiian activists and their lawyers really want sovereignty, because they want control of possible forthcoming money. The majority of Hawaiians will not see a penny of it.

Klaus Wyrtki

Quotables "I would be way too liberal for that guy (Nixon). If I worked for him, he'd say, 'Jessica, you are so fired.'" Jessica Sudduth UNIVERSITY OF HAWAII WAHINE VOLLEYBALL PLAYER Saying that, while both she and President Nixon were from Yorba Linda, Calif., they probably wouldn't have gotten along "The victims all fit the same profile, even the same physical resemblance. My speculation is there may be one person who committed all three of these crimes." George Freitas GARDEN ISLAND POLICE CHIEF On the possibility of a serial rapist and murderer on the west side of Kauai

Religious right poses danger to democracy

As a criminal defense and civil rights attorney, and the law partner of Daniel Foley, I chose to remain on the sidelines of the controversy surrounding his appointment and confirmation as a judge of the Hawaii Intermediate Court of Appeals.

The shrill of the bigoted and ignorant opposition by the religious right to his appointment to the bench reminds me of the words of renown criminal defense attorney Clarence Darrow: "To be an effective criminal defense counsel, an attorney must be prepared to be demanding, outrageous, irreverent, blasphemous, a rogue, a renegade and a hated, isolated and lonely person...Few love a spokesman for the despised and the damned."

The same words are equally applicable to a civil rights attorney like Foley. It is amazing that those from the religious right cared nothing that he is a man of great competence and integrity, as well as a family man devoted to his wife and two sons.

To the religious right, you either agree 100 percent with them or you are their mortal enemy. If they could control this country, they would strip us all of our basic freedoms and impose upon society an ignorance reminiscent of the Dark Ages.

Like Foley, I have fought and will continue to fight for the right of these bigots to be bigots. However, I will also exercise my right to publicly condemn their bigotry and warn our citizens of the mortal danger these people pose to our way of life.

The responsibility to choose freedom or oppression rests with each of us. Pay heed, Hawaii! Eternal vigilance is truly the price of liberty!

Earle A. Partington

Term inequity issue wasn't ignored

Roy Frank Westlake's Aug. 26 letter accuses us of lying and trying to "bury" the unequal Senate terms issue before it was resolved during the recent special session. The current law, providing for longer terms for incumbent senators than challengers, has been in effect since voters approved it in 1992.

To his credit, Bob Watada, executive director of the Campaign Spending Commission, may have been one of the first to bring this issue to the attention of the Legislature.

He informed us, prior to the regular session, of the inequity of the maximum contributions that two candidates for the same Senate seat could receive. In some instances, an incumbent could accept $4,000 from a contributor, while a challenger could accept only $2,000.

Watada had a bill introduced to correct this inequity, and it was passed during the regular session. He did not suggest, however, changing the unequal terms provision prior to the bill introduction deadline. In fact, no one introduced such a bill during the regular session.

We did not try to bury this issue. We sought an opinion from the state attorney general, who advised us in late January that the current law was constitutional, and that no legislation appeared necessary at that time.

Common Cause and other groups, concerned about perceived inequities during the 2002 election, urged us to take action. As Judiciary co-chairmen, we then proposed inserting a proposal drafted by Common Cause into another elections bill.

However, rightly concerned about the lack of public hearings on this proposal, House and Senate leadership refused to allow this. In retrospect, the solution passed benefited greatly by the public hearings held during the special session.

Sen. Avery Chumbley
Sen. Matt Matsunaga
Co-Chairmen
Senate Judiciary Committee

Vote for those who promote less government

This letter is aimed at all Americans who will be voting in this year's elections. As we know, the U.S. is supposed to be a republic, with free people and free elections, under a moral standard set forth by our founding fathers.

The people who wrote our Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights wished this country to be a moral democracy.

Therefore, if you want America to remain free, please support candidates who are in favor of less government in our lives, less regulation in business, less taxes, and less funding for those things that do not directly help the truly needy.

There is way too much money being directed to government, and it's being used foolishly. If we continue along this path, history tells us the next step is socialism, and then fascism.

Bethany Davis
Wahiawa

Nader should be included in presidential debates

Ralph Nader should be included in the upcoming presidential debates. It doesn't matter whether you support Nader for president, or whether Al Gore or George W. Bush will be helped or hurt more if Nader shares the stage with them. It's a question of democracy.

Voters deserve a real choice. They deserve a robust debate before they cast their ballots. There is no justification for keeping Nader out of the debates.

He will be on the ballot in virtually every state. He's a nationally known candidate who has spent decades successfully pushing for legislation that opens up government and protects consumers.

The commission in charge has recommended that only candidates who receive 15 percent of the vote in polls can participate in the debates. This is not surprising, since the commission's members are Democrats and Republicans. The two parties want to keep their stranglehold on our democracy.

How is a candidate from another party supposed to get 15 percent in the polls unless the American people see him matched up against Bush and Gore? What are the Democrats and Republicans afraid of?

Robert G. Devine

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