• Asthma • Another look • Queen’s Bath • Traffic safety • Who is John Kerry? Asthma Re: Foundation plans classes on self-healing for Kauaians. (Article on July 14, 2004, The Garden Island). “Kaua‘i has the highest rate of asthma
• Asthma
• Another look
• Queen’s Bath
• Traffic safety
• Who is John Kerry?
Asthma
Re: Foundation plans classes on self-healing for Kauaians. (Article on July 14, 2004, The Garden Island).
“Kaua‘i has the highest rate of asthma of all the Hawaiian islands, and Hawai‘i has the highest rate of asthma of all the states.”
Asthma is a chronic respiratory disease caused and aggravated by air pollution. West side Kauaians have the highest rate of asthma on Kaua‘i. Our air is polluted by smoke from people burning trash, sugar companies burning cane and plastic drip tubing. When poly-vinyl chloride (plastic drip tubing) is burned, cyanide gas is produced. Our air is also polluted by dust herbicides, fungicides, and pesticides sprayed by sugar and corn companies and diesel fumes from the power plant.
“The State of Hawai‘i government spent 443 million dollars last year fighting asthma.” They should have spent the money fighting air pollution. The government subsidizes the biggest polluters of our air so you can have sugar coated corn flakes and the highest electricity rates in the country. Natural Healing begins with clean air. Why does the Board of Health allow our air to be polluted? We need to address the cause of disease, not the symptoms. The symptoms (asthma) tells us that something is wrong. We need to heal the whole system of our civilization, government, business, agriculture and people by providing pure air, water, food and lots of aloha. Companies that pollute should be fined. Will our government do it? The Board of Health states on their business card “our mission is to ensure you have clean air and water (paraphrased). The Westside of Kaua‘i is polluted and has a high rate of asthma. Is there a connection? What is the truth? Do you even care? Stay healthy. Aloha.
David Maki
Kekaha
Another look
I must thank Alton Miyamoto of KIUC for helping to complete my commentary that was published in The Garden Island regarding the escalating price of electricity on our island.
In my letter I cited the Energy Adjustment part of the electric bill that is supposed to account for changes in the price KIUC pays for fuel. My data (taken straight from my electric bills) and their interpretation were correct – namely that the Energy Adjustment went up 150 percent – as verified by Mr. Miyamoto in his letter published On Thursday, July 22. But my data were incomplete, in that I did not have information on the actual fuel prices over the past year.
Now KIUC has helped me fill that gap by giving us the fuel data, revealing that the increase from August, 2003 to June 2004 (the same period I used to analyze the Energy Adjustment charges) was 57 percent! This is half of the Energy Adjustment charge
Why Mr. Miyamoto then did not proceed to explain this wide discrepancy must go down as the mystery of the month.
In any case, mahalo to Alton Miyamoto for helping the rate payers on this island get a more complete picture of how they are being gouged.
Raymond L. Chuan
Hanalei
Queen’s Bath
The headline in Wednesday’s paper was “Arizona visitor drowns at Princeville”.Three years ago this month, two medics from the American Medical Response team stationed in Princeville, made an unscheduled appearance at the Princeville Community Association Board of Directors meeting to complain about Queen Emma’s Bath. They said they responded to “multiple calls per week” at QEB, that people had had serious injury or death there many times before, and asked that QEB be closed in the interest of public safety.
The PCA subsequently asked the County to close the QEB trail. On March 20, 2002 the County erected a sign “Closed – Danger” at the trail entrance because the County Engineer had concluded the area was a danger to the public. In June of 2002, the County Council directed the beach be reopened due to complaints that some local people like to go there. Since the re-opening, there has been additional deaths at QEB, the most recent last Wednesday.
Isn’t it about time for the County Council re-examine its priorities concerning Queen Emma’s Bath? Government has a responsibility to insure the public safety when hazards obviously exist.
This is not an issue of Hawaiian rights or of individual responsibility, it is an issue of public safety. Allowing Queen Emma’s Bath to remain open is simply irresponsible.
Mike Taylor
Princeville
Traffic safety
I entreat the people of this island planet to slow down, take heed, pay attention, live consciously. Our lives, safety and insanity are at stake.
A few days ago my car was hit from behind by another vehicle while I was driving in Lihue. This makes the fifth time I have been whiplashed as a result of people hitting my car from behind.
Being physically and walking challenged as a result of these impacts has taught me to pay attention and be conscious every moment, every breath, every step. I oftentimes pull over to the side of the road as impatient drivers bear down on my car while I am driving the speed limit.
Again, I entreat the people of this island to:
Slow down, take heed, pay attention, live consciously, relax.
Andrea Cronrod
Anahola
Who is John Kerry?
He goes to war for only four months and gets some medals that others have questioned for their accuracy, ie. a purple heart for a wound that had some blood, but as one of his fellow soldiers says was not as serious as a razor cut.
He comes home and goes to Washington as a war demonstrator where he throws his medals on the steps of the Capital Building in protest.
At the time, he talks to the media about throwing his medals, however, we now find out they weren’t his medals but someone elses ribbons. He told the person whose ribbons he threw that he would go home and get his medals to throw them. He never did.
His current wife marries a rich man and he later dies leaving her all of his fortune.
She uses her ex-husband’s money and buys a husband with medals, then uses her ex-husband’s money to get him elected to the Senate.
He has the most liberal voting record in the Senate, when he votes, and is judged to be farther left than Ted Kennedy having voted against every major weapons program that we used in Bosnia, Afghanistan, and Iraq to win the wars there.
He goes to Detroit and makes a speech about his SUV’s and how he loves them. He gives a speech to a more liberal audience of environmentalists and claims he doesn’t own an SUV. Turns out he clarifies it and says they belong to his family and not him.
Gordon Oswald
Kapa‘a
