• A letter to my representatives • KIUC chugging along • Everything to gain • Mahalo for the laugh A letter to my representatives Dear Sens. Inouye and Akaka, Reps. Hirono and Abercrombie: I am your constituent. I act as
• A letter to my representatives
• KIUC chugging along
• Everything to gain
• Mahalo for the laugh
A letter to my representatives
Dear Sens. Inouye and Akaka, Reps. Hirono and Abercrombie:
I am your constituent. I act as a citizen, veteran, career diplomat, former teacher, factory worker, father and now farmer. I depend on you in matters big and small to achieve proper, efficient, moral governance.
You sought your highly crucial positions to help us function as a nation with a future as well as a past. I appreciate what you do for us given the increasing strains of public service and life.
I now ask your active engagement in a matter of utmost gravity: accountability within Constitutional checks and balances and the rule of law. We expect all officers of the U.S. to live by oaths to preserve, protect, and defend our Constitution.
Is there any doubt whatsoever that executive branch leaders sanctioned repeated and particular uses of torture as defined by U.S. statute and international agreements to which the U.S. is signatory with the advice and consent of the Senate?
As has recently been pointed out in Spain and may soon be in other countries, our leaders’ actions and policies are war crimes.
The U.S. must achieve accountability at home or we create obligations on 144 other signatory nations to do what we fail to do in cases of universal jurisdiction.
Failure to investigate formally causes grave harm to our country here and elsewhere. Failure to act also endangers our soldiers and diplomats who may be captured in any conflict.
Torture is a repugnant crime, never an acceptable policy. To allow now well-documented policies and practices of torture to be unaccountable is to guarantee historical precedent for any president in the future. And it sullies all of us and our ancestors.
We are a government of law, not of people who can redefine practices like water-boarding and prolonged beatings into acceptable “intensive interrogation.” Those practices are torture.
We have confessions of our torturers, testimony of our generals, and Supreme Court cases on habeas corpus matters. Definitions arbitrarily set by our former chief executive — think of Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, Addington and Yoo as agents — do not pass legal or smell tests, no matter how sincerely they acted or what their motives.
Who we are and will be as a nation is at stake in your actions or inactions, as well as those of your colleagues.
We voters have our jobs to do, too, in this high and grave matter. That is why I ask you to join forces with others in the Senate and the House who have taken stands to proceed immediately to appoint a special prosecutor to submit his recommendations by a quick date certain. Start the process now.
We need accountability through checks and balances again as part of our self-governance or cease being a Republican form of democracy. This is a matter of systemic and personal integrity.
Michael A. Ceurvorst, Lawa‘i
KIUC chugging along
I am hoping that a recent headline — “KIUC heads in a new direction” — did not create an incorrect impression.
While we certainly welcome new ideas, please remember that supporting renewables like solar energy is not a new idea for KIUC, even though someone might have gotten that impression from the story.
The truth is, we have been aggressively pursuing all reasonable and affordable alternatives for many years, and have been making steady progress.
Please remember also that the KIUC board has nine directors. Electing three new directors does not constitute a new majority — again an impression that might have been incorrectly created by the story.
That said, we welcome the new directors and look forward to their help, insight and enthusiasm as we join together in a team effort to address the serious challenges we face economically and environmentally.
Dennis Esaki, KIUC board member
Everything to gain
Hawai‘i is tossing around the idea of increasing its cigarette tax 40 percent a pack; this would result in quite a leap in price.
Why? Because there is everything to gain and nothing to lose. And to be quite honest, whatever benefits the state budget, benefits our budget.
An increase of $2 a pack would be a noticeable difference of income for the state if sales continue at their current rate. The increase would serve to alleviate other strained areas of the general budget and curtail taxes from the majority of the community.
You and I know that a higher price tag might also result in a decline of sales. The question then turns to whether or not the state would lose money on such a taxable item. The answer: no!
Less money spent on cigarettes means more available income to spend on other taxable or local goods, stimulating the local economy.
However the biggest benefit resulting from a decline in sales is overwhelmingly the reduction in state spending on healthcare. Hawai‘i spends more than half a billion dollars on healthcare and lost productivity for smoking-related causes.
This number would be reduced substantially if some sort of catalyst would persuade smokers to quit. A catalyst in the form of $2 more per pack of cigarettes? Like I said, everything to gain, nothing to lose!
Catherine Adams, Lihu‘e
Mahalo for the laugh
I would like to personally thank Phil Higginbotham (“How to achieve gay marriage in the U.S.,” Letters, March 29) and The Garden Island newspaper for brightening up my Sunday morning.
I have not laughed that hard at anything in TGI, ever. George Carlin would be proud.
Anela Lauren, Lawa‘i
