Why should anyone listen to Henry Peters?

If I didn't know any better, I would swear that the July 2 op-ed piece by Henry Peters was a brilliant piece of satire. The man who is now complaining about Hawaii state/Bishop Estate "payback time" is the same man who, for many years, served simultaneously as a Bishop Estate trustee and speaker of the House in the state Legislature, insisting that holding both posts involved no conflict of interest. We must be very short on memory or long on forgiveness if we take seriously anything Henry Peters says.

John Wythe White
Haleiwa

Government has taken land like Ka Iwi before

Henry Peters' July 2 column says that the state interfered with the court's mandate between the City & County of Honolulu and Kamehameha Schools/Bishop Estate by condemning the Ka Iwi property after the county changed the designation from resort to conservation without proper consideration. He mentioned that the purchase of 300 acres of waterfront property at $12.8 million is "stealing" because the true market value is much more.

So what else is new? Prior to and at the start of World War II, the U.S. government confiscated several parcels of Bishop Estate's land, such as Hanauma Bay, worth several billion dollars by today's market value. When the government had no more use for the land, instead of offering it first to the private estate, it offered it to the state and county governments.

The confiscated properties should have been returned to the private trust created by Princess Bernice Pauahi Bishop to benefit the education of Hawaii's children. So what else is new when our government takes private property without just compensation?

Wilbert W. W. Wong
Kaneohe

[Quotables] "Everybody comes to the point that he feels like it's time. After 21 years, I feel like it's the right time." Cal Lee, St. Louis School football coach -- the winningest high school football coach in Hawaii history, with a record of 231-31-4 -- who says this will be his last season guiding the Crusaders. "We had to gingerly scrape it off the floor. That doesn't say much about O.J. Simpson; people are still scraping him off the floor." Gene Kaneshiro, Former owner of the defunct Columbia Inn, on what happened to the floor tile commemorating O.J. Simpson's visit to the restaurant in 1969. The tile has been sitting on the restaurant's famed Round Table, which now rests on Kaneshiro's lanai.

Right to bear arms belongs to individuals

Regarding the Star-Bulletin's July 2 editorial, "Ashcroft aligns himself with NRA in slashing FBI's ability to track guns":

There is nothing "extremist" about Attorney General John Ashcroft's views on gun control.

The First Amendment's "right of the people" to assemble peacefully is not a collective right, but an individual one. The Fourth Amendment's "right of the people" to be free from unwarranted searches is an individual right, not a collective one.

So how is it that the Second Amendment's "right of the people" to keep and bear arms is supposed to be a collective right but not an individual one?

The editorial rehashes the same tired arguments that gun-control advocates have been foisting on the public for years.

The editorial also made it clear that your newspaper supports the "ends justifies the means" tactic of gun-control advocates in undermining constitutionally protected rights.

Eric Terashima
Hilo, Hawaii

ACLU Board behaved disgracefully

I've been a longtime supporter and sometime member of the American Civil Liberties Union. Therefore, I feel obligated to dissent with the Hawaii ACLU Board's decision to not invite Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas to the annual Davis-Levin First Amendment Conference.

Moreover, the ridiculous excuses given by some board members for their decision have made a laughingstock of the Hawaii chapter.

Those who have followed this conference have been stirred to very high levels of intellectual exercise by ACLU National President Nadine Strossen's exchanges with conservatives Ralph Reed, Jay Sekulow and Justice Antonin Scalia. Likewise, we could look forward to another free exchange of ideas between two important public figures of highly contrasting views. Hawaii rarely has opportunities to participate in such high-powered debates.

Furthermore, the board's decision is illogical. Some board members have called Justice Thomas the equivalent of a Hitler, anti-Christ, or serial killer. Such attacks, typical of bad freshman-level prose, suggest that individual board members need to re-evaluate whether they are serving the best interests of the organization. If the Hawaii ACLU is willing to silence debate by attacking people rather than debating and dispensing with their ideas, who can we count on to defend free speech?

I've long tired of the Thomas-bashing rhetoric and would find it extremely refreshing to hear the man speak for himself. As ACLU National Executive Director Ira Glasser is fond of saying, "Light is the ultimate disinfectant" with which we may examine and sort through contrasting ideas.

Khalil J. Spencer

Search for elder care eased by providers

The people who take care of our elderly community are sorely overlooked. I say this because my family is considering relocating an elderly relative, and this is virgin territory for me. I've been making many phone calls the last few days. Starting with a list I obtained over the Internet, it was refined when I called St. Francis Hospital, which faxed me a list of nursing homes.

After making phone calls from that list that included Ana Pearl Nursing Home, Hale Ho Aloha, Kuakina, Wahiawa General and Pearl City Nursing, I had a better sense of what I needed (residential, extended home care, foster and waiting lists), which in itself is overwhelming! I was also advised to get the state list of Adult Residential Care Homes off the Internet, which I did.

I am so appreciative of the support I received from everyone. Many returned my calls, and I was more than impressed with their patience, compassion and professionalism. I felt that these are people who really care.

I'll send my personal kudos to everyone I've spoken to, but I would like to express publicly that we in Hawaii are fortunate to have such a caring and accessible community for our elderly population. That's real aloha.

Sueann Carter
Kapolei

Hawaii needs more 'Good Guy' dentists

In every profession there are Good Guys and Bad Guys. Dentistry is no exception. The Good Guys are those dentists in private practice who have banded together and are treating, on a no-fee basis, those patients who otherwise could not afford dental care. Bravo!

The Bad Guys are those few dentists, who, having learned about the clinic at The Queen's Medical Center through recent publicity, have dumped their doubtful-payer cases on that clinic. This overburdened facility has noted a significant increase in case load recently. It is struggling to try to accommodate everyone and still dig itself out from under an impossible financial situation. Auwe!

Robert Levy

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