• Chickens are not good for Kauai • The people are losing their rights • Same-sex is natural • Mayor sign 2491 • Time to stop using chemicals • Sign the bill Chickens are not good for Kauai If you like feral chickens, fine.
• Chickens are not good for Kauai • The people are losing their rights • Same-sex is natural • Mayor sign 2491 • Time to stop using chemicals • Sign the bill
Chickens are not good for Kauai
If you like feral chickens, fine. Just make sure your little feathery friends don’t bother those of us who see them for what they are: invasive pests that prey on the eggs and chicks of native ground-nesting shearwaters, and act as incubators for avian malaria, which may be the single greatest threat to the few remaining native honeycreepers.
While you’re at it, see to it that they don’t wake us up at 2 a.m., dig holes in our gardens and beds and destroy every fruit on our mango trees. And when bird flu arrives on Kauai, it’ll be your job to round up this lice-ridden disease vector and euthanize every last one you can trap.
Good luck, and spare us the specious sentimentality of their arrival with the first Hawaiians. They were just as invasive then as they are now.
John Burns
Princeville
The people are losing their rights
It has been almost 13 years since I had returned home to Kauai. I am from the Abreu family in Lawai.
I had been abroad throughout the world and recently moved from Idaho to Spokane.
I was surprised to see that the Ohana spirit still existed, but the political climate was not what I had hoped for.
Much has changed on Kauai and my family and friends throughout Kauai were working two or more jobs to make ends meet.
My personal opinion is that those in elected positions should bring forth laws to best help the local people, something I found to be lacking.
I remember when we could go hunting with no gates in the cane fields and have our shotgun and rifle in the rear of our trucks.
Why has Kauai and the Hawaiian Islands become so anti Second Amendment?
I moved to the Mainland some 13 years ago just to move to a state that believes in the people’s numerous rights in our Constitution.
How do the people of Kauai and Hawaii continue to allow the stripping of their constitutional rights?
Remember, we are a Republic not a Democracy, and for that, we the people are the foundation of our country.
Mike Chism
US Army, retired
Spokane
Same-sex is natural
The guest editorial on same-sex marriage (TGI, Oct 23) commits two errors.
First, the editorial claims that same-sex sexuality is a “natural wrong.” In fact, several hundred bird and mammal species, including cetaceans, feature same-sexuality as a natural component of their social systems, according to detailed studies in biological peer-reviewed journals.
In primates, specifically, same-sex sexuality is apparently an evolutionary innovation originating around 50 million years ago when the more socially advanced anthropoid branch split from the socially primitive prosimian branch (bush babies, lemurs, tarsiers).
Within the anthropoid branch, same-sex sexuality is more developed in the socially complex old world primates (chimpanzees, gorillas, humans) than in the socially simple new world primates (monkeys with prehensile tails, marmosets, tamarins). Same-sex sexuality accompanies complex social organization.
Second, the editorial commits the naturalistic fallacy of confusing “is” with “ought.” If same-sex sexuality were nearly absent among animals (which it isn’t), then that would not make same-sexuality morally wrong among people. If same-sex sexuality is fairly common among animal species (which it is), then that would not make it morally right among people. What is, is logically independent of what ought to be.
The editorial is thus incorrect in fact and logic.
Joan Roughgarden
Kapaa
Mayor sign 2491
Mr. Mayor Carvalho, please just sign the bill because it is a pono thing to do. There is no job in the world that justifies hurting the health of your own children. Please trust that together, we can take care of everyone on the island because we are blessed with all the resources to do so.
We are brilliant human beings, and protecting our environment and our keiki is our kuleana and legacy.
Maria Clark
Anahola
Time to stop using chemicals
In regards to Bill 2491, I don’t think the people that are for GMOs, pesticides and poison understand what they do. Poison does not contribute to the health of living things. It’s quite the opposite. True, it has been used for 100 years and people spray in their homes and yards. Is this a good thing? I say no! Is having destructive insects in our homes a good thing? I say no!
There are products on the market that are not as toxic, from natural substances and they do a good job of eradicating the problem. We have to start somewhere in reducing the toxic poison that we human beings are making. Is 2491 a perfect bill? No, but it’s a start in the right direction. I’ve been married 34 years. At some point during our marriage I gave in and let my husband use chemical spray in our yard to kill weeds. Our children, three, played in that yard. Within a week they were complaining of blisters on the bottom of their feet. OMG! That was the last time we used chemicals in our yard, 30 years ago.
The county in California where we lived decided to use Round Up to spray the sides of our country road for weeds. Cost effective right? My daughter had horses and they would stick their heads through the fence to eat the dead grass along the road. Their noses became blistered with sores. I alerted the county and they stopped spraying and resumed mowing.
I beg anyone who is financially tied to this destructive force in our community to think twice. Is giving a child cancer worth it? How about a deformed baby? Is this something you would wish on anyone? Please come to your senses and choose life instead of death.
Linda Bothe
Kalaheo
Sign the bill
Please sign Bill 2491 in to law. The people of Kauai have the right to know what is being sprayed on their crops. This is a health issue.
Patrick McCelvey
Kailua
