Ben Cayetano doesn’t seem to have a lot of b—s— in him or put up with much of it. Hawaii’s governor isn’t afraid to use the word in mixed company, though. He said it once or twice while candidly explaining
Ben Cayetano doesn’t seem to have a lot of b—s— in him or put up with much of it.
Hawaii’s governor isn’t afraid to use the word in mixed company, though. He said it once or twice while candidly explaining his new state budget proposal and discussing other topics in a meeting with newspaper editors and reporters last week in Honolulu.
That kind of rhetoric – or lack thereof – is refreshing after a steady diet of tepid, controlled political prattle.
Maybe Cayetano isn’t an overwhelmingly popular officeholder – which ones are? – but based on how he got his views across, it was easy to tell where he stands.
For instance, during a short discourse on the issue of prison overcrowding, Cayetano got into some of the no-frills approach to incarceration in notoriously conservative Arizona, a state he said is “two steps to the right of Genghis Khan.” Hawaii’s public school teachers union is ready to make Cayetano stay after class for his hard-line stand against pay raises. He knows they’re mad and has heard their complaints of feeling undervalued. But he showed no sign of budging from his position that there’s no money for the union’s wage demands, as he repeated, “We can’t pay them what they want.” When Republican state legislators’ traditional mantra of tax cuts came up, Cayetano, a Democrat, basically suggested where the Republicans can put them.
“Ask the Republicans what they’ll cut from the government if there are huge tax cuts? If they say jobs through attrition, that’s—I have to restrain myself,” he said, stopping short of using the b word again.
Cayetano doesn’t seem to worry about his political foes, nor back down from them. Asked by a Big Island newspaper reporter if certain Cayetano policies might be retribution for a lack of election support there for him, the governor brushed the suggestion aside. He added, while wiping his brow with a handkerchief, “People like to categorize me as vindictive. I’m not vindictive.
I’m aggressive.” He drew laughter, some of it nervous, when he got in a gentle dig at newspapers that editorially supported his election opponent two years ago. That he won, he said, “shows you’re not that powerful.” He’s absolutely right. We aren’t. Either that or enough voters like the low reading they get from Cayetano on the b-s meter.
TGI editor Pat Jenkins can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 227) and pjenkins@pulitzer.net
