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Changing Hawaii
TOMORROW evening, as primary election results come spewing forth on local TV and starbulletin.com, it'll be a much different experience for one major candidate, his family and supporters. A shoo-in will
enjoy his victoryFour years ago, at a Kakaako eatery called The Gathering Place, Peter Carlisle and about 60 of his friends nervously awaited the first general election numbers in his heated race against David Arakawa for Honolulu prosecutor.
"What am I going to say when I lose this thing?" Peter had asked himself that morning while lying in bed. When the first printout actually showed him ahead, everybody in the place screamed.
Carlisle jubilantly punched the air with his fist, and wife Judy unsuccessfully tried to mask her astonishment. The contender never lost his lead.
In comparison, this Saturday night for the Carlisle clan is going to be much less exciting. Boring, even.
This time the city's 47-year-old sitting prosecutor is running unopposed, so he'll be officially re-elected with a single vote.
Why the absence of challengers? Three reasons, says a humble Carlisle, ticking them off on his fingers. A political campaign is expensive. "It's hard to get rid of an 'indumbent' " and -- oops, forget that humility part -- he's apparently perceived as being hard to beat.
Maybe he is. While other elected officials have stumbled, bumbled and had to issue letters of apology, Carlisle seems to have done all the right things since 1996:
Come Monday morning, no doubt, Carlisle will be back in his downtown office. He'll enter his immaculately clean work area (he's a self-admitted neat freak) and dive into the last three months of his first term (His second doesn't officially start until noon Jan. 2.He personally prosecuted and won convictions in high-profile cases like Byran Uyesugi's bloodbath at Xerox Hawaii, William Janto's fatal beating of a Wahiawa woman, Gabriel Kealoha's deadly push of an off-duty police officer on the H-1 viaduct and James Steinseifer's killing of three people while he was driving drunk.
Carlisle hopes to expedite the way suspects are charged by using "direct filing," which defense attorneys worry will weaken protection for their clients.
He also wants to lobby for more stringent gun control and he'd prefer seeing more funding for rehab programs and drug treatment programs rather than another expensive prison in the islands.
THIS weekend, though -- while other candidates are hosting big parties at campaign headquarters -- take a moment to think of Peter Carlisle. He'll be spending a quiet night at home with Judy, 14-year-old daughter Aspen, and 12-year-old son Benson.
There'll be no special dinner for the victor, no media pounding on the door demanding interviews, no blinding lights thrust in his face by camera crews.
Not that Carlisle minds the lack of attention. In fact, he jokes, he only wishes the University of Hawaii football game was at home at Aloha Stadium instead of away. That would give him SOME excitement to look forward to.
Diane Yukihiro Chang's column runs Monday and Friday.
She can be reached by phone at 525-8607, via e-mail at
dchang@starbulletin.com, or by fax at 523-7863.