Who will welcome bigoted visitors?

It was good to see letters from N. Reaves of Kansas City, Mo., and Hawaii resident Mariah Young focusing attention on members of the Westboro Baptist Church in Kansas coming to Hawaii to "spread their gospel of intolerance and hatred," as Young put it (Star-Bulletin, Dec. 22).

I frankly do not believe "killing them with aloha" will work with this group. I say they will come, try to spread their hate and depart with their hatred intact. Such are the ways of the bigots, the sick and the depraved. They are not about to be enlightened. Their bigotry is the very essence of their existence. Without it they would feel naked.

What we in Hawaii could do is observe who welcomes them to our islands, hosts them and provides the pulpits to spread their hatred. Therein we will discover Hawaii's own hate group, which we may loathe to do, denying such groups can ever exist in our own melting pot of the Pacific.

Hate groups exists only as they are accommodated and perceive followers to be recruited. Members of Fred Phelps' group apparently believe they have followers to be gained by coming to Hawaii.

Larry T. Hayashida
Wahiawa

Agency could privatize public housing

I am encouraged to read that Governor Lingle has made straightening out the problems at the state Housing and Community Development Corp. of Hawaii a priority (Star-Bulletin, Dec. 20). The community of public and private agencies that serve the homeless have a plan to reduce the number of homeless, and it cannot be accomplished without housing.

Let's create a housing agency that will consider privatizing the public housing units that have been allowed to fall into such extreme disrepair that they are uninhabitable. Let's create and implement a plan to provide special-needs housing. Let's put an end to warehousing people in shelters and get homeless people off the streets.

Housing is a core function of government. Let's get it done!

Lynn C. Z. Maunakea
Executive director
Institute for Human Services

Ethics rules for UH must be maintained

Regarding the letter from Daniel J. Mollway, executive director of the state Ethics Commission (Star-Bulletin, Dec. 21), and Rep. Brian Schatz's proposal to relax the ethics rules for the University of Hawaii (Dec. 13), I fully support the commission. As a scientist who has lamented the inroad of commercialism into scientific research, I believe, if anything, the rules should be strengthened.

During the past two decades, the only proven cases of "scientific fraud" in this country have been in the biomedical field. The reason is simple: This is one field where discovery can be directly linked to personal wealth on the part of the researcher, thus creating great pressure to cheat.

There is a corollary to setting high ethical standards for scientists in their conduct of research and publication, and that is protection of the researcher from undue pressure by companies that support research. It is becoming more common for sponsors to interfere with the publication of a researcher by threatening to withdraw support.

Unless ethical standards are maintained, the corruption of academia that began after World War II will only worsen.

Raymond L. Chuan
Hanalei

Case serves people, not union leaders

There are three high-profile Democrats (Ed Case, Colleen Hanabusa and Matt Matsunaga) competing in the Jan. 4 special election to fill the U.S. congressional seat of the late Patsy Mink. There is a clear difference among these candidates. Matsunaga has received the endorsement from Russell Okata, head of the Hawaii Government Employees Association. Ed Case has not received any endorsements from union leaders.

This is not to say that the majority of government workers follow their union leaders' endorsements. Matsunaga lost his bid for lieutenant governor, even with the HGEA endorsement. Hanabusa led a group of senators in ousting Attorney General Margery Bronster, who was prosecuting several Bishop Estate trustees. People did not forget that, and four years later dumped Hanabusa's colleagues from their Senate seats.

Case has never been beholden to the union leaders and special interest groups. His performance as a state legislator proves that he has worked hard for the welfare of all the people.

I am a longtime HGEA member and have supported the union most of the time. But this time I am supporting Ed Case, who I believe is the most qualified and best person to serve in Congress for the future of Hawaii.

Henry Kim

Hawaii residents share roadways with aloha

My wife and I just returned to the mainland after two wonderful weeks in Honolulu. The weather was fantastic, the restaurant food was great and the aloha spirit prevailed.

But then there is your traffic. Unsynchronized traffic signals, freeways at 35 mph, misleading or nonexistent street signs ... but all that was compensated by the courtesy and consideration displayed by the Hawaii drivers. Signal to change lanes and no problem, you're in; when entering the traffic flow from a private drive, just signal and you're on your way. You won't find this on the 75 mph freeways of California.

Hawaii's drivers truly have the aloha spirit.

Dave Foley
San Diego, Calif.

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