Mayor has good ideas for handling trash

Honolulu has a big trash problem. After years of discussion, I am pleased to hear that Mayor Mufi Hannemann has developed two plans to help solve the trash problem.

One of the plans includes adding a third large boiler to the H-Power plant. It is the cheaper of the two and I think it is a great idea. Turning trash into energy is good, but the ashes still fill up the landfill. This will only prolong the life of the landfill, not eliminate the need for it.

The second plan is to ship the trash out. This option obviates the landfills altogether. I believe that since the city will own the scales that weigh the trash, the city will gain revenue from this process, and so should support the private shippers more. That way the private shippers can send more than 100,000 tons of trash each year elsewhere, taking another step toward making landfills obsolete.

I am greatly content to hear of Hannemann's plan to address the growing trash problem.

Ship the trash and make recycling easier

I support the thought of shipping some or all of our trash to the mainland and then lessening those shipments by recycling more. I feel that doing this is much easier to do, and if people keep recycling more it could become a lot easier.

If we decide to keep our trash here the argument about where the landfill should go can continue for a longer period of time than expected. Also, while the decisions are being made the trash is still piling up.

Some suggestions that I have to make shipping trash easier have to do with using our resources and recycling more. One thing that we could do is add more HI-5 recycling locations around the island.

I feel that these suggestions will really help with not only shipping our trash, but using recycling to our advantage by reducing the trash as well.

America is wasting its greatness potential

I am turned off by the American flag, because I love this country. I am turned off by those who say "God bless America," because I have too much pride and shame in this country. I give too much credit to our nation for all of its great struggles and triumphs from the days of pioneering the West to standing up to the German war machine, the abolition of slavery and women's suffrage to stand here now and only count American casualties from the Iraq war.

The voices that make themselves heard every night, warn against disrupting the sanctity of marriage and "unborn" stem-cell research are not the ones astonished that we stand idly by while 30,000 children a day are dying of starvation and diarrhea. We are a great nation with great wealth and power but what a great nation we would be if we defended more than our own personal gains. The greatness of a country should be measured not by its accumulation of wealth and power, but rather what it does great once it has them.

American Airlines supports our troops

We recently were in Dallas, Texas. American Airlines opened the first-class lounge to the brave men and women in the military who were traveling and connecting on American flights to Iraq and elsewhere.

People talk about doing good things; American Airlines gets my hardiest thanks for its appreciation of our troops!

Condo investors are getting ripped off

I've finally realized that after five years of research, the purchase of a condo in Hawaii is a bad investment; no doubt, comparable to buying a time share! Further, I believe it's time for the attorney general to look into the outrageous maintenance fees, which approach $1,200 a month for a 600-square-foot condo. Someone is ripping off the investors and if this were not bad enough, we find the property management companies taking up to 60 percent of the monthly rental income.

It's time for a complete investigation into both of these issues and I believe there is collusion and price fixing. When one looks at the number of condos for sale in Hawaii, it's obvious people are bailing out because of maintenance and property management fees and adjustable rate mortgages. The agricultural industry died a slow death and I am sure the real estate industry is next.

Senators should cut back on the pork

I beg to differ with Sens. Daniel Inouye and Daniel Akaka on the issue of congressional earmarks (Star-Bulletin, Jan. 29). Too often earmarks are pet projects that lead to pork spending of taxpayers' money. I don't doubt that there have been many worthy earmark projects over the years, but there have also been a great many that were just wasted spending. Often, too, these earmarks are attached to appropriations that have no relation to the original intent of the appropriation. If an earmark project is a worthy one, let it be subject to open debate in Congress.

What Inouye and Akaka don't understand is that Americans are fed up with congressional pork spending. If nothing else, the practice of quietly slipping earmark spending to appropriation bills reeks of ill-propriety.