She appreciates newspaper carriers
I understand that there has been some trouble retaining people to deliver our daily newspaper. I just wanted to send out a thank you to our fantastic delivery person, Litto, here in Princeville and the North Shore. He has never failed us, even when there were problems at the airport or production issues.
I know that many people are getting their news online, and that is fine, but some of us still appreciate receiving the actual thing.
I just want to share my thanks, and even encourage others to show appreciation for this service by maybe remembering to slip them a tip during this holiday season!
Annette Surles, Princeville
Clearly marked homes a must
Recently, I have been involved in free food giveaways at kupunas’ homes in both Lihu‘e and Hanama‘ulu.
I have been the driver with a navigator/co-pilot. The organizations gave us phone numbers: THANK GOODNESS.
The addresses were so very difficult to find!
There are lots of mailboxes without numbers, lots of houses without numbers, lots of houses without either!
Isn’t there a law that says homes should be clearly marked for emergency services? Seems to me that this law needs to be enforced.
We were driving around in broad daylight, and it was still so very difficult. OMG, I can imagine the problems at night!
Everyone knows where they and their close friends live, but the rest of us don’t.
Helena Cooney, Kapa‘a
On some upcoming Supreme Court decisions
With Supreme Court opinions soon forthcoming, GOP justices will preen themselves on their devotion to “original intent,” bragging that it prevents them from being partisan or activist. They’ll style themselves the keepers of the true Constitution.
Yet, when the doctrine was asserted in the 1970s, Justice Brennan called it “little more than arrogance cloaked as humility.”
Why? Activist justices must explain in detail how and why they reached their outcome. Original-intent justices assert their decision was forced by the “original intent” they divined.
The inability to be partisan is a chimera.
The justice frames the question. Compare: “How often must a militia train to protect private ownership of guns?” to “Was a right of self-defense recognized?”
Current “original-intent” theory rejects consulting the expressed intent of the writers, the minutes of the Constitutional Convention, the Federalist Papers, or even the debates in the ratifying states. Instead, the understanding of a “reasonable person living at the time” controls. Any contemporary document becomes authority; newspapers then were as partisan as media now. How simple to project their 21st-century view of “reasonable” into the 18th century. No one from 1787 is likely to protest.
Often, debates were protracted and divisions evident; uneasy compromises meant there was no shared meaning. For some provisions now relevant, a dearth of discussion: no basis to state an “original intent.”
If original intent truly were unbiased, machine algorithms couldn’t do so well predicting their votes, using as criteria: the GOP position on the issue; the Catholic Church’s and evangelical Christians’ position on the issue; the nature of the dispute; and the type of parties.
Some knowledge of American history, or familiarity with English, would be required for prediction. Worse, our founders were iconoclasts, revolutionaries and innovators in nation-building. They appreciated that they walked an untried path, willing to make mistakes to attempt a unique democracy; no monarchy or theocracy. How horrified they’d be to become icons themselves, and have their naive efforts enshrined as the last word, infallible. How saddened to learn that their Constitution was deemed static, with its meaning in a time dead and gone rigidly controlling.
It is the very adaptability of the Constitution’s general principles to cope with future problems, of types unimaginable when drafted, that makes it great and enables it to endure.
Jed Somit, Kapa‘a
Jed Somit’s opinion on the Supreme Court’s misguided reasoning is the most outstanding and succinct description of the unspoken/unwritten truths that the majority justices are failing to acknowledge.
The public quotes assigned to the Justices on a number if issues outlined by Mr. Somit, to me, show a serious lack of a higher thought process.
Katharine Hayhoe: ‘The true threat is the delusion that our opinion of science (facts) somehow alters its reality’
Thank you Mr. Somit for such a well written l piece.
Jed, your cogent and important letter should have been given a prominent place on the editorial page, not buried in the Letters section. Sadly, The Garden Island newspaper rarely speaks out on matters that might be considered controversial. Mustn’t ruffle any feathers, after all. Their last editorial was published on July 12 — nearly five months ago — and had to do with distressed swimmers off Wailua. Worthy of a news story, certainly, but not an editorial.
Original intent is not so difficult to understand…just read the Federalist Papers and for some counter balance the Anti-Federalist writings too.
You lament that the constitution is deemed static. Well, Jed, rules/laws need to be somewhat static or as in the case of the constitution relatively tedious to change. An example may shed light on the issue:
Let’s say you and I are to play a game of checkers or chess with a substantial cash prize but an important catch: I can change the rules whenever it suits me. Or, say home teams are allowed to modify rules of their particular sports games at will. Fair?
RG DeSoto
Actually, the rules of tournament checkers have changed several times since 1900, which is a more fair example, since no one is alive since 1788.
Great letter Jed! The Constitution has been the primary building block for the creation of the most wonderful, free, generous, and wealthiest Country for all of its Citizens in the history of the World! Even those on welfare, and other subsistence programs, in America are wealthier than 97% of the World’s population who live on less than $5.50 per person per day! We must continue to follow the Constitution to the exact intent provided by our Founding Fathers, or everything will come tumbling down. Of course, there will be those continuing to scream for “modernizing” the Document so they can usher in Socialism and “free” stuff for all, but we all know that will instead usher us into the fate of the 97% – and make everyone, other than Government overseers, equally poor!
We have already made major changes to the Constitution, and nothing came tumbling down.
Do you guys actually write to the Garden Island newspapers to express your feelings? If you liked a candidate and you wish for him or her to get in, do you just write do the newspaper? 1st amendment right. I don’t how popular you would be though to put in a not qualified candidate. I mean back in the 1978 there was starting off his career, Bill Kaipo Asing. I think the news on Bill was that he had no experience or intellectual insight of the job itself, yet he made it a career. Why? Because he was a local guy and his skin color was brown. Which means he stood for many brown looking or black people of the island. So the white color thing didn’t bother him. He had a long career. I would have write on him, but I wouldn’t know how to approach this issue with being irritated or ignorant. Only one way to express your ideas. That is to be ignorant to get your point across. That is one issue anyway in politics and from the 1978s.
Supporters of Roe in the high court cannot address relevant text in the Constitution that supports the 1973 decision, because there isn’t any. They can only point to legal precedent of a political decision, which it was. That’s “adaptability”
But here is an interesting development in the American experience: The declaration of independence and “all men are created equal” are ideas which served as inspiration for the 19th century abolitionist movement and the civil rights movement of the 1960’s. Yet they carry no legal authority
Actually, the opinions in favor of Roe quote many portions of the Constitution. I think even more, recall that the original Constitution lacked what we now called the “Bill of Rights”, which is why those portions are called “Amendments.” The drafters felt they were unnecessary, as such protections for citizens were among the Natural Laws they felt were inherent in a (then) modern view of government. Roe is squarely in the center of the Enlightenment thinking of the Eighteenth Century Rationalists including Madison, Jefferson and other drafters.