• Mandatory road test • ‘Equal Access’ • The ‘bigger’ picture • NSA is ‘thought police’ • Les Miserables is fantastic! Mandatory road test With the recent traffic accident on Saturday, July 20, that resulted in the death of a
• Mandatory road test • ‘Equal Access’ • The ‘bigger’ picture • NSA is ‘thought police’ • Les Miserables is fantastic!
Mandatory road test
With the recent traffic accident on Saturday, July 20, that resulted in the death of a man on a motorcycle and the driver of the car who hit him being 82 years of age, it is high time to road test all our drivers more often. Vision testing is simply not enough. We should have a mandatory road test for all drivers every few years.
Dara Fugett
Kapaa
‘Equal Access’
Bible club at school does not mean that students go around clubbing one another with the Bible. Nor should it mean that the U.S. Constitution is being abrogated. The 1992 Supreme Court case Lee v. Weisman specifically prohibits the practice of compulsory prayer at school-sponsored events by citing the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause and the Establishment Clause. These two clauses state, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”
Bible clubs on campus are extra-curricular — not sponsored by the school. Bible clubs are non-compulsory. Any student may attend or withdraw by own volition.
School administrators are bound by a 1984 Supreme Court ruling providing for “Equal Access” to all groups wanting to host extra-curricular functions on campus.
It is hard to imagine that any Bible club facilitator, student officer of a Bible club, or any of our school administrators would disrespect the highest law of our great country. As for myself, I would die to defend it.
For the last six years I have been involved with the Bible Club at Waimea Canyon Middle School. We do not proselytize.
Every denomination is welcome to participate. We only read and examine the Bible and do not engage any church’s doctrines. Students are encouraged to ask questions and bring their own experiences to the discussion. We have consistently between 50-60 students in attendance.
In the last year, facilitators found themselves in two separate suicide interventions, have helped to reconcile families, and have helped to provide assistance to students in desperate need, keeping students from living on the streets. I really believe that the Bible clubs on campus are doing a great deal of good. Let’s not disparage them for goodness sake.
P.S. In regards to separation of church and state, we even bring our own whiteboard markers so as not to use the school’s pens and always try to leave the classroom cleaner than the way we found it so as not to burden the janitor!
The Rev. Dr. Olaf Hoeckmann-Percival
Waimea United Church of Christ
The ‘bigger’ picture
The reason Pfluger didn’t get stricter punishment was because the state refused to help him with the dam.
Second, the house the people were staying in didn’t have a permit to be there.
Don’t blame a judge. It’s a bigger picture than most know.
Barbara Beissert
Kilauea
NSA is ‘thought police’
NSA is totally out of control. It’s about time to dismantle this mess. We as Americans cannot be spied on and judged by a group of people who have without a doubt removed themselves from everyday American life.
This warped view of America, where the pursuit of happiness and rights to privacy are being determined by those people who have given up both freedoms, is neither productive nor acceptable.
At one time in China a citizen could be jailed for having “improper political views” as it was determined to be a form of insanity. We seem to be heading toward this type of “thought police” with the NSA “connecting the dots” using phone tracking and certainly have lost important freedoms already.
Give us liberty or give us death, not the NSA.
Barney Blankenship
Kapaa
Les Miserables is fantastic!
This is one of the best theater productions I have ever seen, and that includes those in New York City. If you like good theater, please plan to see it before it closes. The acting, the voices, and the children are incredible. This runs Thursday through Sunday at the Puhi Theatrical Warehouse, through Aug. 4. It is not to be missed!
PS. You will not believe that HCT put this together in six weeks!
William Hackett
Kalaheo
