• Make war on rats • Being annexed by New Zealand could work Make war on rats The editorial on April 22 assured us that there is no big deal about rat lungworm disease if one is careful about washing edibles and
• Make war on rats • Being annexed by New Zealand could work
Make war on rats
The editorial on April 22 assured us that there is no big deal about rat lungworm disease if one is careful about washing edibles and not leaving food outside.
However, rats are an invasive species and I know of no justification for their being here. Rats can carry lots of other diseases as well as feeding on the eggs of birds. I suggest an island wide war on the rats.
Yesterday a friend told me that her neighbors had found a rat’s nest on their property. I called the humane society and was told that a trap called the Rat Zapper is effective as the most painless way to kill rats and handle their remains. It is also safe for other pets. (Several models are available on Amazon.com, one at Home Depot, etc.)
I have placed one along my side wall near my garden for the rats to get used to. In a few days I will bait it and hope to contribute to the extermination of these pests. Will you join me?
Marjorie Gifford, Princeville
Being annexed by New Zealand could work
What an interesting letter from the US expat, now a New Zealander, titled Hawaii more like New Zealand. I couldn’t agree more. We watch our country become increasingly out of touch with our wars, our education system, our slipping medical care ratings, etc.
Hard-working students cannot afford college without a lifetime of debt. Income inequality increases yearly while our government politically caters to wealth holders.
Instead of making inroads into better serving our entire population we get an ongoing push for things like school vouchers which would remove funds from public education and hand it to those able to add enough to place their children in private schools.
Also proposed are health insurance vouchers that low income families would find not adequate to cover their premium. There are proclamations that we should eliminate Social Security as it would benefit the poor who should just invest their own excess funds in high earning instruments, etc.
These things are the tip of the iceberg. Until our country realizes that we are all better off when those at the bottom of the income ladder are also better off, this situation will continue.
What would it take to begin evening the playing field for all segments of society? It would take a more socialist type of government as New Zealand and most of Scandinavia have.
However this is anathema to many conservatives who’s blinders come on with the very mention of democratic socialism as they point to Venezuela being the resulting consequence, never the countries who are thriving under this type of government.
The Kanaka Hawaiian sovereignty movement is one way to succeed if the movement would expand to include all the state’s people and not just native Hawaiians. Another interesting way would be to see if New Zealand really would annex us. We have plenty of similarities including being Pacific Islands settled by the ultimate islanders, Polynesians.
Paulo Tambolo, Wailua Homesteads
