• Real reasons • Wait is over? Real reasons And a very Happy New Year to you too, Mr. Mickens! This letter is in response to your letter of Jan. 4, 2010 wherein you admonish me for continuing “to ignore”
• Real reasons
• Wait is over?
Real reasons
And a very Happy New Year to you too, Mr. Mickens! This letter is in response to your letter of Jan. 4, 2010 wherein you admonish me for continuing “to ignore” the “multitude of reasons” given to me why we should change our present system of government to that of a county-manager system. In turn I have asked, as the Charter Review Commission has asked, for identification of “specific concerns about the current system of government” needed to be addressed.
Permit me to list the reasons for change which I have seen in print so far via columns, editorials and letters to the editor:
1. This system exists in 45 of our 50 states but of the 100 best places in the United States 77 of them use the county-manager system.
2. A mayor is selected because of popularity. A manager is chosen (by the council) because of education and experience.
3. There is a need to improve various functions of our county government. (What functions?)
4. There is a “desperate need and effective channel for interchange of views between our citizens and our mayor and the council on local issues” (How?)
5 Then, there is the Dec. 30 letter of Mr. John Hoff. His reasons are “putting the county manager to a vote by the people” and “If it doesn’t work we can always return to a mayoral system.”
6. And then, there is your letter of Jan. 4, which reveals, I believe, part, if not the major reason for your advocacy of the council manager system.
I must applaud Mr. John Hoff for his “endeavors” to rectify problems and conditions he believed needed attention. However, the “endeavors” he described encountered problems of “favoritism,” “ineptness,” “refusals,” “ignoring” — actions or inaction of people engaged in “governance” on Kaua‘i, by the state and Kaua‘i Island Utility Cooperative.
Your letter of Jan. 4 provides all the reasons for your disagreement with the mayor’s refusal to reappoint Mr. Bieber. In doing so, which you have every right to do, your letter tells me also that you have or have had disagreements, directly or indirectly, with the actions or inaction of the mayor, the council and county departments.
You are critical of the mayor’s failure to reappoint a BOE member, the hollowness of his explanation, his failure to explain his process of selection, the appointment of people who conform to his views or are chosen to keep the status quo. The council is criticized for not doing its job in recent years by not denying confirmation of appointees and county departments are likewise criticized for unnamed reasons. You believe the performance of those in “governance” is unsatisfactory, but there may be mitigating or extenuating circumstances which, viewed from a different perspective, may say it’s okay.
In all your discussion, there is no reference to any violation of any provision in our Charter by the actions or inaction of the mayor, the council or departments.
Accordingly, I must conclude that your reason for change in our government system is not based upon any deficiency in our Charter … the need for change as you see it as based on your criticism of the “governance” on Kaua‘i … the people elected or appointed to implement or operate the “government” of Kaua‘i.
Differences of opinions and points of view will exist forever even in a county-manager system with a “qualified executive and accountability.” Disagreements and disappointments will be just as prevalent.
Since the problem here is not one of “government” per se, but one of “governance” the cure lies not in changing the system but in electing and appointing those who agree with your opinions and points of view.
Have I missed any of the multitude of reasons?
Alfred Laureta, Lihu‘e
Wait is over?
Well here we go again. Ms. Dux seems to be confused about the war in Iraq, etc. (“Still waiting for an answer,” Letters, Jan. 9).
OK, let’s see if we with our liberal blinders on can understand the following:
1. Iraq and Saddam violated 16 UN resolutions.
2. Iraq tried almost daily to shoot down UN and ally airplanes who were policing the no-fly zone as mandated by the UN.
3. Saddam attacked and killed thousands of innocent people while attempting to overthrow a friendly neighbor and free world ally Kuwait.
4. Saddam threatened to attack Saudi Arabia.
5. Saddam gave $25,000 to every family of every terrorist who was successful in killing Americans.
6. Iraq used chemical weapons of mass destruction to kill thousands of men, women and children in an attempt to a successful genocide of the Kurds.
7. Every Intelligence service of every major power in the world including the U.N., Russians, Israelis, Germans and United States declared Saddam had weapons of mass destruction and was working to perfect a nuclear device. The only debate they were having was how close he may have been.
Oh, we could go on and on, but since the few points mentioned above are not understandable by left-leaning and atheistic zealots, what’s the point. Too bad our savior Obama wasn’t president. He could have just gone over there, bowed his head to Saddam until his chin touched the floor and talked some sense into him. He could also have talked with Saddam’s son Uday and stopped him from setting off bombs in the ocean to kill thousands of fish at one time for sport, or from killing any more generals with a baseball bat at a dinner party in front of hundreds of people, or from cutting off the ears of Iraq’s soccer players because they lost a tournament. What we really needed was a community organizer. Right.
And oh, by the way, for those of us who were whining and sniveling ad infinitum about the war being based on the big bad United States and their greed for oil, perhaps you watched the bidding process Iraq just undertook to award all of their oil contracts to outside establishments. Yep, the oil fields were awarded to Norway, Russia, England (Shell) and a country in Africa who will receive all the benefits for finding, developing and selling Iraqi oil. The big bad major United States oil companies didn’t even bid.
You were dead wrong then and you just don’t have a clue now. But then La La Land is a better place to be, right?
Gordon Oswald, Kapa‘a
