The following was originally posted four years ago on "Memorial Day," Sunday, May 25, 2008. We report it today because we feel just as strongly today as we did then.
WHERE HAVE ALL THE COLLIE FLOWERS GONE: It’s dead soldier day again. People are honoring those who took the lives of others for no reason other than that they were young and stupid and were told to do so by demented old men who sought to plunder, rape and pillage.
Not us. Today we honor the veterans of anti-war movements throughout history.
In our lifetime every war in which our country has engaged has been an invasive, imperialistic debacle waged at the behest of profiteers and in the name of raw power.
And the one thing they have in common is that when we all “wake up” afterward we are left with a generation of cripples- both physical and mental- and a bunch of tombstones.
Every dead soldier died in vain. There never was a noble cause or even a valid one. The soldiers died protecting nothing but greed and avarice.
The notion that soldiers protected our right to say this is ludicrous. Every war has been accompanied by a diminution of our constitutional rights. Those that fought against the war are the ones who kept free speech alive in the face of depraved and often felonious attempts of the war mongers to stifle it.
Only a true coward kills because they are told to do so. But there have been a few truly courageous young men and women that have been there to say no- we will not go and kill for your plunder. We will not demonize and dehumanize to enable those without the guts to stand up and say no to that which they know to be wrong to pull a trigger and delay the remorse until they get home- if they get home.
Recently someone we know wrote of how he was duped into fighting in Viet Nam- the most common of all excuses for homecoming soldiers for why they went and “fought for their country”. He claimed he had no way of knowing that fighting against communism, domino theories and the Asian menace wasn’t the right thing to do because “no one told me”.
Bullcrap- you just weren’t listening. The writer claimed that there weren’t even any real anti-war activates until 1967 when the fact is that there were major anti-war demonstrations in all major cities in 1965 and many going back to 1961... and some earlier.
No one can tell us it wasn’t a choice made. If by the time you were 18 you hadn’t heard people say that sending young people to die for the demented politics and overflowing wallets of so-called “leaders” you just weren’t listening... to us or even Republican Ike when he spoke of the danger of the military-industrial complex.
Starting in 1965 when this mangy mutt was but a 13 year old pup, many afternoons were spent at the American Friends’ Service committee offices advising young men on how to get out of the draft.
In those days you had two choices- kill or go to jail unless you could show your particular religious upbringing forbade you from fighting and killing in a war. And you had to have a note from your religious leader stating this was true and you, uniquely and individually, were a conscientious objector... in which case you still had to serve the war effort, they just didn’t give you a gun but instead a bed pan.
But there was a book called 4F that listed all of the physical anomalies and illnesses that would enable you to move your 1A designation - aka “cannon fodder”- to the medically excused 4F classification.
This draft-counseling dingo-coyote never lost a client. College deferments were very popular. But if frat life wasn’t your cup o’ tea and you couldn’t find a physical deferment on your own, we’d find one for you- or even make one up. And if that was too hard in those days they “asked” and the right answer could get you out.
If all else failed it was the old licking-the-peanut-butter-off-your-butt-in-front-of-the-sergeant dodge or a similarly bizarre act... we even held rehearsals. And there was always Canada where AFSC had a network set up to welcome you and find you a place to live and even a job.
But you’d be surprised at how many honest kids there were who wanted out of the draft. So finally, along with a fellow draft-counselor who himself was approaching draft age, we wrote and filed the first successful “conscientious objector” filing for someone without a religious background.
And we couldn’t help but notice what was going on in the next office where the walking wounded coming back from the war congregated to bemoan their prior fate.
They didn’t always show physical scars. The trick was to allow them to use their mental anguish to express their anger at a system that had robbed them of their youth, health and integrity.
They organized against the nonsense and told others- like the ones who really didn’t know any better- why despite what their parents and the politicians told them there was no “just cause” or “noble service”, just the depraved ravings of lunatics and fearful little minds who waged war for peace, forced servitude for justice, imprisoned for freedom and killed for life.
We say this not to just tell a story but to show that like most, it was nobody’s fault if you were ignorant in the early 60’s but had a revelation in 1969 just as it was if you believed the 2003 lies and finally had a revelation in 2006 or 2007.
If a 13-year-old knew better, why didn’t you?
They say it’s different now that the draft has been temporarily suspended- even though it is still mandatory to register- but the rhetoric remains the same.
Returning Iraq vets still say “you never told us they were lying before the war. All of us believed the lies.”
Bullcrap. Millions screamed from the rooftops about blood for oil and a lying maniac and his butchers in the White House and serving in Congress. You just didn’t listen.
Meanwhile some obviously tortured souls now, as then, continue to want us to actually honor those that should have known better... and in many cases did but signed up anyway.
Some may say we are being cruel to those who lost sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, uncles and aunts and fathers and mothers. But the real cruelty is that the Dead Soldier Day rhetoric gives aggrieved people a lie to believe in to fool and delude themselves and eventually to tell to their kids and grandkids fooling generations into thinking that it is, was or will ever be in any way an honorable thing to be a soldier- alive or dead.
It is not that all those that grieve on Memorial Day are perpetuating the myths Cindy Sheehan grieves for her son Casey. But as to those that must accept and repeat the lies to rationalize the waste of their dead relatives’ lives it is even sadder still to see them cling to the notion that their kin did not die in vain and served and died honorably.
For that they should be ashamed of themselves because by perpetuating that myth they prospectively kill again. They’ve now become the ones the kids wrongly believe before marching off to kill someone else they never met.
And so we honor those who did not serve, those who tried to warn others, those that resisted the draft and later those that didn’t fall for the “army with the condos” scam, those who didn’t sell their soul for a college education, from those who were harassed beaten and jailed in Washington and Chicago in the 60’s to those harassed, beaten and jailed in NYC at the Republican Convention in 2004 to everyone who participated in every demonstration, organizing meeting, puppet show, pentagon levitating, and letter writing session in between.
Those are the honorable- those are the ones whose service to their country we should remember and honor today.
Those who listened in the early 60’s- no matter what their age- had a lot to listen to....as do kids today, as will kids tomorrow.
As long as people speak out, kids will see through the charade of honorable war and they won’t go and fight and kill and die for nothing.
We’ll leave you with three examples of the information available to those considering the murderous life from way back when- the first in some words written by a lady that lives down the street that were popular in 1965 about who’s really to blame, the second by a kid we saw at Gertie’s Folk City in ’61 who wrote words in 1964 about taking sides, the third by an unfortunate son who survived the 60’s to write again in 2007 telling us not to take it any more.
-----------------------
Universal Soldier
by Buffy Sainte-Marie
( “I wrote "Universal Soldier" in the basement of The Purple Onion coffee house in Toronto in the early sixties. It's about individual responsibility for war and how the old feudal thinking kills us all. Donovan had a hit with it in 1965.”)
He's five feet two and he's six feet four
He fights with missiles and with spears
He's all of 31 and he's only 17
He's been a soldier for a thousand years
He's a Catholic, a Hindu, an atheist, a Jain,
a Buddhist and a Baptist and a Jew
and he knows he shouldn't kill and he knows he always will
kill you for me my friend and me for you
And he's fighting for Canada, he's fighting for France,
he's fighting for the USA,
and he's fighting for the Russians and he's fighting for Japan,
and he thinks we'll put an end to war this way
And he's fighting for Democracyand fighting for the Reds
He says it's for the peace of all
He's the one who must decide who's to live and who's to die
and he never sees the writing on the walls
But without him how would Hitler have condemned him at Dachau
Without him Caesar would have stood alone
He's the one who gives his body as a weapon to a war
and without him all this killing can't go on
He's the universal soldier and he really is to blame
His orders come from far away no more
They come from him, and you, and me
and brothers can't you see
this is not the way we put an end to war
----------------
With God on Our Side
by Bob Dylan
Oh my name it is nothin'
My age it means less
The country I come from
Is called the Midwest
I's taught and brought up there
The laws to abide
And that land that I live in
Has God on its side.
Oh the history books tell it
They tell it so well
The cavalries charged
The Indians fell
The cavalries charged
The Indians died
Oh the country was young
With God on its side.
Oh the Spanish-American
War had its day
And the Civil War too
Was soon laid away
And the names of the heroes
I's made to memorize
With guns in their hands
And God on their side.
Oh the First World War, boys
It closed out its fate
The reason for fighting
I never got straight
But I learned to accept it
Accept it with pride
For you don't count the dead
When God's on your side.
When the Second World War
Came to an end
We forgave the Germans
And we were friends
Though they murdered six million
In the ovens they fried
The Germans now too
Have God on their side.
I've learned to hate Russians
All through my whole life
If another war startsIt's them we must fight
To hate them and fear them
To run and to hide
And accept it all bravely
With God on my side.
But now we got weapons
Of the chemical dust
If fire them we're forced to
Then fire them we must
One push of the button
And a shot the world wide
And you never ask questions
When God's on your side.
In a many dark hour
I've been thinkin' about this
That Jesus Christ
Was betrayed by a kiss
But I can't think for you
You'll have to decide
Whether Judas Iscariot
Had God on his side.
So now as I'm leavin'
I'm weary as Hell
The confusion I'm feelin'
Ain't no tongue can tell
The words fill my head
And fall to the floor
If God's on our side
He'll stop the next war.
------------
I Can't Take It No More
by John Fogerty (2007)
I Can't Take It No More
I Can't Take It No More
I'm sick and tired of your dirty little war
I Can't Take It No More
You know you lied about the casualties
You know you lied about the WMD's
You know you lied about the detainees
All over this world
Stop talking about staying the course
You keep a-beating that old dead horse
You know you lied about how we went to war
I Can't Take It No More
I can't take it
I can't take it
I bet you never saw the old school yard
I bet you never saw the national guard
Your daddy wrote a check and there you are
Another fortunate son
I can't take it no more
I can't take it no more
I'm sick and tired of your dirty little war
I can't take it no more
I can't take it no more
I can't take it no more
I'm sick and tired of your dirty little war
I can't take it no more
Monday, May 28, 2012
Friday, May 25, 2012
OFF THE DEEP END
OFF THE DEEP END: Nobody questions whether rats will desert a sinking ship. But how long they will wait before doing so probably depends on the circumstances. But when one starts, the rest usually follow
Obviously they can't take too long, which is why at least two councilmembers decided they'd waited long enough to abandon the SS P.O.H.A.K.U and they'd be damned if they were going down with Captain Spittle of Malaprop.
Councilmember Nadine Nakamura was backpedaling like Michael Jackson on steroids. She apparently didn’t like her political prospects should she let stand as her final word on the subject her recent vote to allow Kaua`i Prosecuting Attorney Shaylene Iseri Carvalho to run out the clock. And Chair Jay Furfaro also smelled trouble should he do the same.
Even Kipukai Kuali`i and Dickie Chang silently went along with the program, leaving only Iseri's first Mate Mel Rapozo standing on the deck.
For those who thought last week's vote to pass the Office of the Prosecuting Attorney's (OPA) budget without any resolution to Iseri's scandalous refusal to answer until she got a county-paid special counsel to represent her was going to be the last word on the subject, guess again.
Because Wednesday (go to 9:24:20), after Yukimura introduced a measure to ask the Board of Ethics (BOE) to look into the matter and read a statement written by Bynum (see below) detailing Iseri's misdeeds (Bynum was absent due to the imminent birth of his first grandchild), it became apparent that continuing to allow Iseri to get away with alleged crimes and misdemeanors was a bad idea if they expected to get reelected.
Before Bynum's statement was read, Iseri's First Mate, Councilmember Mel Rapozo, had attempted to defuse potential defections by launching into a "my-my, it's enough to give a lady the vapors" spiel, tying to claim that he'd never seen anything like this level of scrutiny in his political career- seemingly forgetting about his own politically motivated crusade to oust former Chief of Police KC Lum.
He then announced that, anyway, the administration had "launched an inquiry" into the whole matter.
But when Yukimura read Bynum's statement and "corrected" Rapozo by saying the administration was looking into the procurement improprieties but not the general ethics charges, it became apparent that no one was going to stay aboard with Mel and Shay.
Bynum's statement read:
On April 11, 2012 the Council met in executive session on matters that included the POHAKU program. An Executive Session was posted for a briefing related to POHAKU on April 18, 2012. On April 18th Deputy County Attorney Mona Clark responded to members questions in open session. Ms. Clark indicated that the information was time sensitive stating “I think it is important that the Council has as much information as possible, as soon as possible.” Council member Yukimura asked if there were possible liabilities for the Council that could increase if additional time went by. The answer was yes. In spite of this, a majority of the Council voted to delay the discussion for two weeks. On May 2, 2012 the briefing was finally held. However no action was taken.
I have concerns (Bynum continued) among them are:
- The use of county address as the address for the registered agent of a private business.
- The fact that the Pohakuprogram.com website directs payment to a private business and the Council has not been provided with a copy of any contract with that business.
- The Prosecutor has refused to answer questions from the Council related to the Pohaku program until the County provides her special Counsel for legal representation.
Subsequently we heard that the POHAKU program had stopped operating, however Ms. Iseri-Carvalho said last Tuesday May 15, on the Council floor “our office can internally run the P.O.H.A.K.U program, which we will continue to do almost immediately.” As of yet no one is looking into the possible Charter violations. After what, in my opinion, is too much delay the posting for this body to take appropriate action is finally here before us today.
County officials take an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States, The Constitution of the State of Hawai‘i and the Kaua‘i County Charter. I have been told by all the County Attorneys that have held the office since I became a Council member that when a question regarding a potential violation of the Charter is raised the Council has a duty to see that an appropriate inquiry is held. The Board of Ethics is an appropriate body for such an inquiry. So I will obviously support this motion.
But rather than outright supporting the call for an ethics referral, Furfaro announced that, at the request of County Attorney Al Castillo, he would support a deferral to either June 6 or 13 until the administration’s "inquiry" was finished.
But it was Nakamura who really started the stampede to the exits when she said she would essentially support the ethics referral saying she would "support the bullet points" contained in Bynum's statement. That caused the other two rats present to get caught up in the stampede and Kuali`i and Chang went along with the deferral since there were not only apparently not enough votes to defeat it but enough to approve, if not the referral to the BOE, then at least the deferral until June.
We'll see what the "inquiry" comes up with but for now there appears to be a growing awareness among councilmembers that, whether the local newspaper is covering the scandal or not, people have been following the story on TV and on-line. And if councilmembers want to maintain a spot on their own SS Council it may be time to abandon Iseri's leaky little POHAKU putt-putt.
Obviously they can't take too long, which is why at least two councilmembers decided they'd waited long enough to abandon the SS P.O.H.A.K.U and they'd be damned if they were going down with Captain Spittle of Malaprop.
Councilmember Nadine Nakamura was backpedaling like Michael Jackson on steroids. She apparently didn’t like her political prospects should she let stand as her final word on the subject her recent vote to allow Kaua`i Prosecuting Attorney Shaylene Iseri Carvalho to run out the clock. And Chair Jay Furfaro also smelled trouble should he do the same.
Even Kipukai Kuali`i and Dickie Chang silently went along with the program, leaving only Iseri's first Mate Mel Rapozo standing on the deck.
For those who thought last week's vote to pass the Office of the Prosecuting Attorney's (OPA) budget without any resolution to Iseri's scandalous refusal to answer until she got a county-paid special counsel to represent her was going to be the last word on the subject, guess again.
Because Wednesday (go to 9:24:20), after Yukimura introduced a measure to ask the Board of Ethics (BOE) to look into the matter and read a statement written by Bynum (see below) detailing Iseri's misdeeds (Bynum was absent due to the imminent birth of his first grandchild), it became apparent that continuing to allow Iseri to get away with alleged crimes and misdemeanors was a bad idea if they expected to get reelected.
Before Bynum's statement was read, Iseri's First Mate, Councilmember Mel Rapozo, had attempted to defuse potential defections by launching into a "my-my, it's enough to give a lady the vapors" spiel, tying to claim that he'd never seen anything like this level of scrutiny in his political career- seemingly forgetting about his own politically motivated crusade to oust former Chief of Police KC Lum.
He then announced that, anyway, the administration had "launched an inquiry" into the whole matter.
But when Yukimura read Bynum's statement and "corrected" Rapozo by saying the administration was looking into the procurement improprieties but not the general ethics charges, it became apparent that no one was going to stay aboard with Mel and Shay.
Bynum's statement read:
On April 11, 2012 the Council met in executive session on matters that included the POHAKU program. An Executive Session was posted for a briefing related to POHAKU on April 18, 2012. On April 18th Deputy County Attorney Mona Clark responded to members questions in open session. Ms. Clark indicated that the information was time sensitive stating “I think it is important that the Council has as much information as possible, as soon as possible.” Council member Yukimura asked if there were possible liabilities for the Council that could increase if additional time went by. The answer was yes. In spite of this, a majority of the Council voted to delay the discussion for two weeks. On May 2, 2012 the briefing was finally held. However no action was taken.
I have concerns (Bynum continued) among them are:
- The use of county address as the address for the registered agent of a private business.
- The fact that the Pohakuprogram.com website directs payment to a private business and the Council has not been provided with a copy of any contract with that business.
- The Prosecutor has refused to answer questions from the Council related to the Pohaku program until the County provides her special Counsel for legal representation.
Subsequently we heard that the POHAKU program had stopped operating, however Ms. Iseri-Carvalho said last Tuesday May 15, on the Council floor “our office can internally run the P.O.H.A.K.U program, which we will continue to do almost immediately.” As of yet no one is looking into the possible Charter violations. After what, in my opinion, is too much delay the posting for this body to take appropriate action is finally here before us today.
County officials take an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States, The Constitution of the State of Hawai‘i and the Kaua‘i County Charter. I have been told by all the County Attorneys that have held the office since I became a Council member that when a question regarding a potential violation of the Charter is raised the Council has a duty to see that an appropriate inquiry is held. The Board of Ethics is an appropriate body for such an inquiry. So I will obviously support this motion.
But rather than outright supporting the call for an ethics referral, Furfaro announced that, at the request of County Attorney Al Castillo, he would support a deferral to either June 6 or 13 until the administration’s "inquiry" was finished.
But it was Nakamura who really started the stampede to the exits when she said she would essentially support the ethics referral saying she would "support the bullet points" contained in Bynum's statement. That caused the other two rats present to get caught up in the stampede and Kuali`i and Chang went along with the deferral since there were not only apparently not enough votes to defeat it but enough to approve, if not the referral to the BOE, then at least the deferral until June.
We'll see what the "inquiry" comes up with but for now there appears to be a growing awareness among councilmembers that, whether the local newspaper is covering the scandal or not, people have been following the story on TV and on-line. And if councilmembers want to maintain a spot on their own SS Council it may be time to abandon Iseri's leaky little POHAKU putt-putt.
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
YOU REALLY GOTTA ASK
YOU REALLY GOTTA ASK?: Yeah, yeah, we know- hope springs eternal and all that stuff. But to tell you the truth it doesn't look good.
This year we just may find out what would happen if they had an election and nobody ran.
It's really hard to find anyone who isn't ready to throw the bums out this November, but usually there are plenty of new bums standing in line to replace them. Except, as the June 5 deadline for candidates to file approaches, other than incumbents, there is nary a Kaua`i legislative candidate who has even "pulled papers" much less filed them.
Despite the fact that all of of our legislators on Kaua`i voted for the dreaded bill that would have more or less repealed parts of HRS 343- the Hawai`i Environmental Protect Act (HEPA)- by exempting projects from local review, permitting, and of course public hearings, all thus far are running unopposed.
In State Senator District 8 Ronald D Kouchi, and in the House, State Representatives in District 14, 15 and 16, Derek S K Kawakami, James K Tokioka and Daynette S Morikawa (respectively) will get free passes if nothing changes, although we hear there may be a surprise announcement from a familiar name as the filing deadline approaches.
And while both incumbent Shaylene C Iseri-Carvalho and challenger Justin F Kollar have filed to run for Kauai Prosecuting Attorney, no one has filed to challenge any of the incumbent council members.
Six of the current seven- Dick S Chang, Joseph J Furfaro, Kipukai L Kuali'i, Nadine K Nakamura, Melvin Rapozo and Joann A Yukimura- have pulled papers with Rapozo and Kuali`i having actually filed them. But only three challengers- all pretty much unknown and with little chance of garnering enough support to oust any of the incumbents- have pulled papers and none of those has yet filed.
According to a Facebook page under that name, the first challenger, Christina Gutierrez-More of Kapa`a
is a Northern San Joaquin Valley, California native residing on Kauai for the past 9 years. She has been a dedicated mother of two and hardworking entrepreneur for the past 6 years. Her goal is to represent the Kauai people in issues that matter most to our island community. She is focused on positive growth, sustainability, renewable energy, affordable living and finding the means to support our ailing public school system and salvaging it's fundamental art programs. The natural beauty of Kauai and its residences' are dear to her heart and in her best interest. Please support her campaign and enable her to represent your community and make a stand for Kauai as a council member.
At a page called "Keikilane" a profile of someone named Leialoha L Sanchez- also of Kapa`a according to her filing- says
I was born in the Philippines to a Navy Captain, William Flores of Kailua and a domestic engineer, Debra Naihe of Waimanalo. I have 2 older brothers, Kalani and Kaipo and a younger sister, Ka’ohu. After the death of our father, our family relocated to Kaua’i. We spent the remainder of our childhood there and like most ‘ohana’s living in rural Hawai’i; we are “thick as thieves”. I am happily married to my best friend, Robin, who weird enough shares the same middle name as me. We have 2 beautiful flowers (girls) who add to our arrangement, Ka’uolani who's 7 years old and Kaumakakaihuia who will be 3 years old in December. The day I became a teacher was the day I became a mother.
In 1997, I moved to Hilo to further my education. I attended Ka Haka Ula o Ke’elikolani Hawaiian Language College at the University of Hawai’i at Hilo. I graduated with my Bachelors of Arts degree in Hawaiian Language with a minor in Pacific Island History. My Bachelor’s degree has allowed me to work in several Hawaiian immersion schools and other charter schools that serve Native Hawaiian students and or provides a Native Hawaiian perspective to its students.
Reflection
As a teacher, I found it to be true that education is the one constant in many children’s lives and has an immense influence in shaping the person they become. My work experiences have made more appreciative of education as a way of life rather than a career.
Assuming it is the same person who filed, Elizabeth K Toulon of Koloa is a scion of the kama`aina Knudsen/Toulon clan. According to "campaignmoney.com," she has given money to right wing PACS such as "Minuteman PAC Inc," an anti-immigration, "secure borders" organization and "Eagle Forum PAC," an anti-abortion PAC apparently under the control of Republican activist Phyllis Schlafly as well as to the brief 2008 presidential campaign of Elizabeth Dole, former Secretary of Transportation under President George W Bush.
And that it. Of course the deadline could be extended depending on a ruling from the federal courts- expected any day now- on the Hawai`i reapportionment plan. But that doesn't change the fact that no one seems interested in serving in office.
And who can blame them. As jobs go it's a real stinker and can be a career killer. The salary sucks for both legislator and council and, although each is considered a part time job, they take up most of your time and limit your employment choices because an "understanding boss" is a necessity.
Job security is a real conundrum. If you do keep getting reelected you then get pegged in the public's eye as one of those "professional politicians" that no one likes. As soon as you're an incumbent you're automatically just the latest bum to be thrown out.
Who needs it? Just to get started, as anyone who knows the drill will tell you, the first thing you need to do is get out your extensive address book and call 100 friends and ask them each for $100. If you can't do that successfully you better just forget it. And if you get that done then it's time to cold-call a list of another 1000 people and ask each of them for $100.
If you do happen to get elected- usually not because the voters especially like you but because they really dislike the other guy- every one of those people who gave you money is going to call you and ask you for something... usually something you'd rather not do. And if you want to get reelected you have to either do what they ask or figure out how to turn them down without pissing them off.
Of course that's not to mention spending every waking moment you're not at work at the high school girls' water polo games, Tutu's baby lu`au or Uncle's birthday and every other boring vacuous event you'd never in your right mind attend... oh- and walk up to and schmooze everyone there, even those assholes you'd never otherwise talk to.
Do you really need to ask why no one is running? We're surprised that anyone ever does.
This year we just may find out what would happen if they had an election and nobody ran.
It's really hard to find anyone who isn't ready to throw the bums out this November, but usually there are plenty of new bums standing in line to replace them. Except, as the June 5 deadline for candidates to file approaches, other than incumbents, there is nary a Kaua`i legislative candidate who has even "pulled papers" much less filed them.
Despite the fact that all of of our legislators on Kaua`i voted for the dreaded bill that would have more or less repealed parts of HRS 343- the Hawai`i Environmental Protect Act (HEPA)- by exempting projects from local review, permitting, and of course public hearings, all thus far are running unopposed.
In State Senator District 8 Ronald D Kouchi, and in the House, State Representatives in District 14, 15 and 16, Derek S K Kawakami, James K Tokioka and Daynette S Morikawa (respectively) will get free passes if nothing changes, although we hear there may be a surprise announcement from a familiar name as the filing deadline approaches.
And while both incumbent Shaylene C Iseri-Carvalho and challenger Justin F Kollar have filed to run for Kauai Prosecuting Attorney, no one has filed to challenge any of the incumbent council members.
Six of the current seven- Dick S Chang, Joseph J Furfaro, Kipukai L Kuali'i, Nadine K Nakamura, Melvin Rapozo and Joann A Yukimura- have pulled papers with Rapozo and Kuali`i having actually filed them. But only three challengers- all pretty much unknown and with little chance of garnering enough support to oust any of the incumbents- have pulled papers and none of those has yet filed.
According to a Facebook page under that name, the first challenger, Christina Gutierrez-More of Kapa`a
is a Northern San Joaquin Valley, California native residing on Kauai for the past 9 years. She has been a dedicated mother of two and hardworking entrepreneur for the past 6 years. Her goal is to represent the Kauai people in issues that matter most to our island community. She is focused on positive growth, sustainability, renewable energy, affordable living and finding the means to support our ailing public school system and salvaging it's fundamental art programs. The natural beauty of Kauai and its residences' are dear to her heart and in her best interest. Please support her campaign and enable her to represent your community and make a stand for Kauai as a council member.
At a page called "Keikilane" a profile of someone named Leialoha L Sanchez- also of Kapa`a according to her filing- says
I was born in the Philippines to a Navy Captain, William Flores of Kailua and a domestic engineer, Debra Naihe of Waimanalo. I have 2 older brothers, Kalani and Kaipo and a younger sister, Ka’ohu. After the death of our father, our family relocated to Kaua’i. We spent the remainder of our childhood there and like most ‘ohana’s living in rural Hawai’i; we are “thick as thieves”. I am happily married to my best friend, Robin, who weird enough shares the same middle name as me. We have 2 beautiful flowers (girls) who add to our arrangement, Ka’uolani who's 7 years old and Kaumakakaihuia who will be 3 years old in December. The day I became a teacher was the day I became a mother.
In 1997, I moved to Hilo to further my education. I attended Ka Haka Ula o Ke’elikolani Hawaiian Language College at the University of Hawai’i at Hilo. I graduated with my Bachelors of Arts degree in Hawaiian Language with a minor in Pacific Island History. My Bachelor’s degree has allowed me to work in several Hawaiian immersion schools and other charter schools that serve Native Hawaiian students and or provides a Native Hawaiian perspective to its students.
Reflection
As a teacher, I found it to be true that education is the one constant in many children’s lives and has an immense influence in shaping the person they become. My work experiences have made more appreciative of education as a way of life rather than a career.
Assuming it is the same person who filed, Elizabeth K Toulon of Koloa is a scion of the kama`aina Knudsen/Toulon clan. According to "campaignmoney.com," she has given money to right wing PACS such as "Minuteman PAC Inc," an anti-immigration, "secure borders" organization and "Eagle Forum PAC," an anti-abortion PAC apparently under the control of Republican activist Phyllis Schlafly as well as to the brief 2008 presidential campaign of Elizabeth Dole, former Secretary of Transportation under President George W Bush.
And that it. Of course the deadline could be extended depending on a ruling from the federal courts- expected any day now- on the Hawai`i reapportionment plan. But that doesn't change the fact that no one seems interested in serving in office.
And who can blame them. As jobs go it's a real stinker and can be a career killer. The salary sucks for both legislator and council and, although each is considered a part time job, they take up most of your time and limit your employment choices because an "understanding boss" is a necessity.
Job security is a real conundrum. If you do keep getting reelected you then get pegged in the public's eye as one of those "professional politicians" that no one likes. As soon as you're an incumbent you're automatically just the latest bum to be thrown out.
Who needs it? Just to get started, as anyone who knows the drill will tell you, the first thing you need to do is get out your extensive address book and call 100 friends and ask them each for $100. If you can't do that successfully you better just forget it. And if you get that done then it's time to cold-call a list of another 1000 people and ask each of them for $100.
If you do happen to get elected- usually not because the voters especially like you but because they really dislike the other guy- every one of those people who gave you money is going to call you and ask you for something... usually something you'd rather not do. And if you want to get reelected you have to either do what they ask or figure out how to turn them down without pissing them off.
Of course that's not to mention spending every waking moment you're not at work at the high school girls' water polo games, Tutu's baby lu`au or Uncle's birthday and every other boring vacuous event you'd never in your right mind attend... oh- and walk up to and schmooze everyone there, even those assholes you'd never otherwise talk to.
Do you really need to ask why no one is running? We're surprised that anyone ever does.
Saturday, May 19, 2012
BLOWING CHUNKS
BLOWING CHUNKS: It seems appropriate that sewage is once again spilling into the ocean at Nawiliwili. After all, all that crap being generated up the hill in Lihu`e this week had to go somewhere.
People all over town were asking "do you smell that?" on Tuesday and it didn't take an olfactorally-advanced detective to discover the source as being the Kaua`i County Council Chambers.
That was when our seven stilted servants once again turned to the budget for what, from all indications, appears to be the biggest criminal enterprise on Kaua`i these days- the Office of the Prosecuting Attorney (OPA). Those who have been under a pohaku might want to read up on OPA Godmother Shaylene Iseri-Carvalho and her P.O.H.A.K.U. program.
And another great must-read, blow-by-blow account of Tuesday's session is available via Joan Conrow for anyone who doesn't have the time to watch the debacle... although the latter is well worth the investment of an hour (start about an hour in) if just for the comedic value.
No one expected much in the way of discussion regarding evil mastermind Iseri's all-purpose now-you-see-it-now-you-don't combination misdemeanor diversion program/reelection campaign tool. She's been busy lawyering up and taking the fifth so to no one's surprise, with the aid of her Council(hench)man Mel Rapozo and his refuse-to-recuse sidekick Kipukai Kuali`i, her council nemesis Tim Bynum and his second JoAnn Yukimura once again failed to get any "answers" to the same kinds of questions all the other department heads had to answer in order to receive their yearly budget appropriation.
Lesser Iseri sycophants Council Chair Jay Furfaro, and Councilmembers Dickie Chang and Nadine Nakamura managed to help shut things down out and keep the relevant allegations of crimes and misdemeanors from the public's ears and eyes, running out the clock without any repercussion to the budget... and of course the local newspaper has been too busy promoting flower shows, defunct food banks and poisonous GMO corn to notice the P.O.H.A.K.U. mess.
But while the council busied itself exploring new corners and crevices on the other side of the looking glass, it might well have been County Attorney Al Castillo who stole the show.
This week's prize for "Most Convoluted Abuse of the Law" goes once again to the program "Legal Opinions From Al's Ass," the show that asks the statutory question "did he really just say that?"
This time Castillo actually told Yukimura that the council can't appropriate "line items" in the budget- specific amounts designated for specific uses like a salary for a certain position or a piece of equipment or furniture.
Despite the fact that that's what a line-item budget does by definition, Castillo told the assembled that to restrict department heads as to what the money can be used for would be violate "the separation of powers" and be "interfering with the administration."
After a few "let me get this straight" questions, Yukimura simply gave up, flabbergasted by the notion that a department head like Iseri can now take all money appropriated for her department and spend it on anything her black little heart desires.
Finally things got as curiouser as they could get when Nakamura revealed that, according to the finance director, the P.O.H.A.K.U. was either "pau" or "suspended". But attempted verification of that information apparently depended on how many times one asked the question, so the council spent the next half hour asking over and over until Iseri herself got up and told them it wasn't really pau or suspended but rather being run internally in her office.
By that point everyone was thoroughly confused and befuddled, but it didn't really matter because that was when Furfaro ruled the clock had officially run out, apparently because the only part of the day that matters to Furfaro was beckoning: lunch.
The next move in this monkey chess game will be played at this coming Wednesday's council meeting when, the council will consider the following agenda item:
C 2012-170 Communication (05/17/2012) from Councilmember Yukimura, requesting Council approval of her request that the Board of Ethics conduct an investigation of whether violations of the Code of Ethics have occurred in connection with the creation and operation of the POHAKU Program and related matters.
In addition, the matter is listed for an executive session.
And speaking of wasting time, get ready to once again to vote on a charter amendment that would give these clods four-year terms.
The claim by councilmembers is that "we can't get anything done in two years." But the message from the voters has been "we're not sure we want you to 'get anything done.' If there was a way to give you two month terms, we'd probably go for that."
It's not like Kaua`i voters haven’t said "no freakin' way" way too many times to keep track of over the past few decades. Yet the council is once again apparently going to ask the electorate to approve doubling the time between elections. The last time we said "no" was in 2006 when we also passed "term limits" of eight years.
If you get a chance watch the "debate," do so with an eye toward the unmitigated arrogance and sense of entitlement.
The assumption that these office are theirs once they are elected is palpable. Talk of "slots opening up" when the "eight-years are up" is bandied about with no sense of the fact that they have to run for re-election every two years.
The voters will no doubt reject four-year terms once again and the council will no doubt try again in a few years. If anything, we'd probably pass a charter amendment to prohibit the council from asking us more than once every 20 years.
But if you're looking for the obvious source of the sewage spill it might be the latest "big flush" of $120,000 into the Kaua`i Marathon. Every year it's been the same thing- for no apparent reason the taxpayers have been forced to shovel wads of cash into the event with promises that "this will be the last year." Only it hasn't been and apparently never will be since this year's appropriation seems to be circling the drain with little opposition from council members.
That money could go a long way if it were to be spread wisely among the charitable non-profits that serve the island's neediest. But instead it's shunted directly into the coffers of hotel owners, airlines and other off-island entities, soon to be converted into campaign contributions. Supposedly a few dollars will trickle-down to local businesses and service industry employees, but no one is really quite sure how that works, and council members didn't seem interested in asking any questions so they weren't told too many lies.
It is an election year after all. It can only get worse.
People all over town were asking "do you smell that?" on Tuesday and it didn't take an olfactorally-advanced detective to discover the source as being the Kaua`i County Council Chambers.
That was when our seven stilted servants once again turned to the budget for what, from all indications, appears to be the biggest criminal enterprise on Kaua`i these days- the Office of the Prosecuting Attorney (OPA). Those who have been under a pohaku might want to read up on OPA Godmother Shaylene Iseri-Carvalho and her P.O.H.A.K.U. program.
And another great must-read, blow-by-blow account of Tuesday's session is available via Joan Conrow for anyone who doesn't have the time to watch the debacle... although the latter is well worth the investment of an hour (start about an hour in) if just for the comedic value.
No one expected much in the way of discussion regarding evil mastermind Iseri's all-purpose now-you-see-it-now-you-don't combination misdemeanor diversion program/reelection campaign tool. She's been busy lawyering up and taking the fifth so to no one's surprise, with the aid of her Council(hench)man Mel Rapozo and his refuse-to-recuse sidekick Kipukai Kuali`i, her council nemesis Tim Bynum and his second JoAnn Yukimura once again failed to get any "answers" to the same kinds of questions all the other department heads had to answer in order to receive their yearly budget appropriation.
Lesser Iseri sycophants Council Chair Jay Furfaro, and Councilmembers Dickie Chang and Nadine Nakamura managed to help shut things down out and keep the relevant allegations of crimes and misdemeanors from the public's ears and eyes, running out the clock without any repercussion to the budget... and of course the local newspaper has been too busy promoting flower shows, defunct food banks and poisonous GMO corn to notice the P.O.H.A.K.U. mess.
But while the council busied itself exploring new corners and crevices on the other side of the looking glass, it might well have been County Attorney Al Castillo who stole the show.
This week's prize for "Most Convoluted Abuse of the Law" goes once again to the program "Legal Opinions From Al's Ass," the show that asks the statutory question "did he really just say that?"
This time Castillo actually told Yukimura that the council can't appropriate "line items" in the budget- specific amounts designated for specific uses like a salary for a certain position or a piece of equipment or furniture.
Despite the fact that that's what a line-item budget does by definition, Castillo told the assembled that to restrict department heads as to what the money can be used for would be violate "the separation of powers" and be "interfering with the administration."
After a few "let me get this straight" questions, Yukimura simply gave up, flabbergasted by the notion that a department head like Iseri can now take all money appropriated for her department and spend it on anything her black little heart desires.
Finally things got as curiouser as they could get when Nakamura revealed that, according to the finance director, the P.O.H.A.K.U. was either "pau" or "suspended". But attempted verification of that information apparently depended on how many times one asked the question, so the council spent the next half hour asking over and over until Iseri herself got up and told them it wasn't really pau or suspended but rather being run internally in her office.
By that point everyone was thoroughly confused and befuddled, but it didn't really matter because that was when Furfaro ruled the clock had officially run out, apparently because the only part of the day that matters to Furfaro was beckoning: lunch.
The next move in this monkey chess game will be played at this coming Wednesday's council meeting when, the council will consider the following agenda item:
C 2012-170 Communication (05/17/2012) from Councilmember Yukimura, requesting Council approval of her request that the Board of Ethics conduct an investigation of whether violations of the Code of Ethics have occurred in connection with the creation and operation of the POHAKU Program and related matters.
In addition, the matter is listed for an executive session.
And speaking of wasting time, get ready to once again to vote on a charter amendment that would give these clods four-year terms.
The claim by councilmembers is that "we can't get anything done in two years." But the message from the voters has been "we're not sure we want you to 'get anything done.' If there was a way to give you two month terms, we'd probably go for that."
It's not like Kaua`i voters haven’t said "no freakin' way" way too many times to keep track of over the past few decades. Yet the council is once again apparently going to ask the electorate to approve doubling the time between elections. The last time we said "no" was in 2006 when we also passed "term limits" of eight years.
If you get a chance watch the "debate," do so with an eye toward the unmitigated arrogance and sense of entitlement.
The assumption that these office are theirs once they are elected is palpable. Talk of "slots opening up" when the "eight-years are up" is bandied about with no sense of the fact that they have to run for re-election every two years.
The voters will no doubt reject four-year terms once again and the council will no doubt try again in a few years. If anything, we'd probably pass a charter amendment to prohibit the council from asking us more than once every 20 years.
But if you're looking for the obvious source of the sewage spill it might be the latest "big flush" of $120,000 into the Kaua`i Marathon. Every year it's been the same thing- for no apparent reason the taxpayers have been forced to shovel wads of cash into the event with promises that "this will be the last year." Only it hasn't been and apparently never will be since this year's appropriation seems to be circling the drain with little opposition from council members.
That money could go a long way if it were to be spread wisely among the charitable non-profits that serve the island's neediest. But instead it's shunted directly into the coffers of hotel owners, airlines and other off-island entities, soon to be converted into campaign contributions. Supposedly a few dollars will trickle-down to local businesses and service industry employees, but no one is really quite sure how that works, and council members didn't seem interested in asking any questions so they weren't told too many lies.
It is an election year after all. It can only get worse.
Sunday, May 13, 2012
SOMETHING DIFFERENT ON MOTHERS AND MOTHERS' DAY
SOMETHING DIFFERENT ON MOTHERS AND MOTHERS' DAY
A recent crisis in my life gave me the opportunity to reconnect with feelings I had shortly after my mother gave birth to me.
I remember feeling angry at having been pushed out into the world. I remember feeling very scared. But my mommy held me so tight and so close to her bosom and she hugged me and fed me mother's milk and I loved my mommy sooo much and my mommy loved me sooo much.
Whenever I feel bad I remember that feeling and I feel better.
Remember mommies: hold you babies tight and give them all the love you can. And then give them more. And for that matter do it for all of those whom you love and love you. We are all just scared and a little angry and love and holding each other tight is what gets us though.
I love my mommy. My mommy loves me. Thank you mommy for making it all better. Happy Mothers Day Mommy.
A recent crisis in my life gave me the opportunity to reconnect with feelings I had shortly after my mother gave birth to me.
I remember feeling angry at having been pushed out into the world. I remember feeling very scared. But my mommy held me so tight and so close to her bosom and she hugged me and fed me mother's milk and I loved my mommy sooo much and my mommy loved me sooo much.
Whenever I feel bad I remember that feeling and I feel better.
Remember mommies: hold you babies tight and give them all the love you can. And then give them more. And for that matter do it for all of those whom you love and love you. We are all just scared and a little angry and love and holding each other tight is what gets us though.
I love my mommy. My mommy loves me. Thank you mommy for making it all better. Happy Mothers Day Mommy.
Friday, May 4, 2012
SPIT IT UP
SPIT IT UP: No, Shaylene didn't grab us off the street and throw us in her own personal dungeon. Nor did Beth Tokioka get out the pins and the voodoo doll.
And after an MRI "gut check" we've confirmed that our recent nausea is not, as we suspected, due to the prospect of four years of having to listen to the voice of former Governor Ben Cayetano should he become the mayor of Honolulu.
We regret the lack of a high fiber diet for the past 20 years (damn, dem Safeway baguettes is tasty), but the diverticular gods apparently have other people to sicken today so maybe between bathroom runs we can play a little catch-up today.
Of course the news that Judge Kathleen Watanabe threw out Prosecutor Shaylene Iseri-Carvalho's politically motivated charges against her blood-feud enemy Councilmember Tim Bynum in the "Rice-Cooker-Gate" case- and made sure she couldn't file them again- wasn't much of a surprise. The real laughter was that the "special prosecutor" assigned to the case was none other than former one-term Kaua`i Councilmember and current Deputy Prosecutor on Maui, Richard "Sweating Bullets" Minatoya.
Minatoya really had little choice but to go along with Watanabe's charade of taking Iseri's department off the case and then getting someone else to "investigate" Iseri's envisioned manifestations of the criminal mind of Tim Bynum.
Apparently Watanabe couldn't bring herself to just dismiss the charges all by herself, or better still jail Iseri for fraud and other "alleged" misconduct. The Judgy-Wudgy wouldn't want to deprive Iseri of due process just because Iseri has so little regard for due process herself.
(Parenthetically we just have to ask why it is that people who hate lawyers have such reverence for judges. Where do they think judges come from- the Judge Fairy?)
Once Minatoya talked to Iseri's hench-persons in the planning department and examined some of the evidence of Shay's and her "Igor," First Deputy Prosecutor Jake Delaplane's crimes and misdemeanors, he fulfilled his role of being "shocked, shocked" to find gambling at Rick's.
As an aside we can't let the fact that Minatoya's name is in the news go by without telling the tale of how he got that middle name.
It was we believe 1998 (we don't need no stinkin' fact checks) when then one-term Councilmember Mary Thronas decided to run for mayor (if we remember the correct chronology), trying to unseat then-Mayor Maryanne Kusaka.
Thronas failed in her mayoral bid after referring to Kusaka's office as "a Filipino taxi cab" and talking about "jewing-down" somebody-or-other... all within earshot of a reporter who apparently didn't know that those kinds of things aren't supposed to be reported on Kaua`i.
We were helping produce a "Video Voters' Guide" and had a couple of freebie rooms at the old Kaua`i Resort to do it. We had prepared questions for council and mayoral candidates and the questions were to be provided to each candidate exactly one hour before their individually scheduled taping times.
When Thronas came in we handed her the questions. She looked the piece of paper and then looked back at us and then looked back to the paper as if to ask "what the heck am I supposed to do with this?"
She never did glance at the content but rather spent the next hour gossiping with her hair and makeup people as they put her face in order. We actually had to read her the questions to her before she answered them... without of course really answering them, in quite the "accomplished politician" style .
Next up was the head-shaven Minatoya who had squeaked onto the council two years previously and had not exactly spent the biennium endearing himself to the electorate, serving as just another "bum" to be thrown out... just like the bum he had replaced.
Minatoya came in ten minutes before his appointed time to receive the questions and when we told him that, to be fair, we had to wait until exactly one hour before his taping time to give him the questions, he proceeded to stare at his watch for the next 10 minutes like he was waiting for the priest to arrive for last rites.
When we finally gave him the paper he began to look it over like it was his death warrant. What had previously been a trickle of perspiration now began flowing from his chrome-dome by the barrel-full. We didn't take a lot of notice and continued to yack about nothing in particular until Minatoya jumped up and, loud enough for them to hear him at the nearby Lydgate Park Pavilion, screamed "SHUT UP- I'VE ONLY GOT AN HOUR."
Needless to say by "showtime" Minatoya looked like he'd stepped out of a dunking booth. He stumbled his way through his answers, lost the election (some say because of the performance which played for months on public access TV) and was never heard from again on Kaua`i- until now.
Anyway, now we wait for the other shoe to drop as Bynum plots his revenge against Iseri, who has been busy lawyering-up over budget-related as well as other questions the council has over her P.O.H.A.K.U. program and other assorted sordid activities.
The council met in secret executive session on Wednesday regarding P.O.H.A.K.U. and next Wednesday will discuss it in public although the effect on Iseri's budget- which goes to public hearing next Wednesday at 5 p.m.- may be negligible in an election year since "dollar-funding" the entire Office of the Prosecutor (OPA) isn't really an option.
By the way, we just can't let this go without noting how hilarious it is that other island media have- due to a well established hatred of Bynum over the transient vacation rental issue- credited Councilmember JoAnn Yukimura with leading the investigative battle to reveal Iseri's "alleged" crimes.
The fact is that Yukimura has actually been serving as a mouthpiece for Bynum's research into Iseri's activities, but because Bynum wouldn't exactly be the best front-man for any public interrogation, Yukimura, to her credit, as taken up the reigns of the fight to publicize Iseri's shenanigans.
But the real news this week is the sudden departure of the local newspaper's "new" editor Renee Haines. We hear she was fired, not because she was censoring huge swaths of copy filed by her less-than-competent staff regarding Shaylene-related scandals and instead running fluff pieces Iseri gave her.
The publisher could care less about that and might have even been ordering it. They don't really care about much as long as the Happy Camper's column isn't printed blurry.
But apparently Haines had so little news savvy after coming over from the advertising side of the newspaper business that, as a fake newsperson, she personally wrote and published a fake story from fake marine biologist named Terry Lilley- who works for fake-everything Hanalei boatyard owner Mike Sheehan- and Lilley's fake "toxic levels of heavy metals in Hanalei Bay" report- all without checking with anyone as to what the truth is.
But if the local paper is a joke, the real joke is of course the Honolulu Star-Advertiser which has yet to say a word about the whole Iseri-Bynum brouhaha. That may be changing after Bynum's attorney Dan Hempey sent out a press release regarding Watanabe's ruling yesterday. But the joke may be about to become a shaggy dog story because the reporter assigned to the neighbor islands, Rosemary "No Dateline" Bernardo, has apparently yet to set foot on a neighbor island for a story, preferring to file her stories from the S-A's city desk.
We just love this place. Even bending over the toilet, it's endlessly entertaining.
We'll be posting whenever we can.
Eat your fiber kiddies.
And after an MRI "gut check" we've confirmed that our recent nausea is not, as we suspected, due to the prospect of four years of having to listen to the voice of former Governor Ben Cayetano should he become the mayor of Honolulu.
We regret the lack of a high fiber diet for the past 20 years (damn, dem Safeway baguettes is tasty), but the diverticular gods apparently have other people to sicken today so maybe between bathroom runs we can play a little catch-up today.
Of course the news that Judge Kathleen Watanabe threw out Prosecutor Shaylene Iseri-Carvalho's politically motivated charges against her blood-feud enemy Councilmember Tim Bynum in the "Rice-Cooker-Gate" case- and made sure she couldn't file them again- wasn't much of a surprise. The real laughter was that the "special prosecutor" assigned to the case was none other than former one-term Kaua`i Councilmember and current Deputy Prosecutor on Maui, Richard "Sweating Bullets" Minatoya.
Minatoya really had little choice but to go along with Watanabe's charade of taking Iseri's department off the case and then getting someone else to "investigate" Iseri's envisioned manifestations of the criminal mind of Tim Bynum.
Apparently Watanabe couldn't bring herself to just dismiss the charges all by herself, or better still jail Iseri for fraud and other "alleged" misconduct. The Judgy-Wudgy wouldn't want to deprive Iseri of due process just because Iseri has so little regard for due process herself.
(Parenthetically we just have to ask why it is that people who hate lawyers have such reverence for judges. Where do they think judges come from- the Judge Fairy?)
Once Minatoya talked to Iseri's hench-persons in the planning department and examined some of the evidence of Shay's and her "Igor," First Deputy Prosecutor Jake Delaplane's crimes and misdemeanors, he fulfilled his role of being "shocked, shocked" to find gambling at Rick's.
As an aside we can't let the fact that Minatoya's name is in the news go by without telling the tale of how he got that middle name.
It was we believe 1998 (we don't need no stinkin' fact checks) when then one-term Councilmember Mary Thronas decided to run for mayor (if we remember the correct chronology), trying to unseat then-Mayor Maryanne Kusaka.
Thronas failed in her mayoral bid after referring to Kusaka's office as "a Filipino taxi cab" and talking about "jewing-down" somebody-or-other... all within earshot of a reporter who apparently didn't know that those kinds of things aren't supposed to be reported on Kaua`i.
We were helping produce a "Video Voters' Guide" and had a couple of freebie rooms at the old Kaua`i Resort to do it. We had prepared questions for council and mayoral candidates and the questions were to be provided to each candidate exactly one hour before their individually scheduled taping times.
When Thronas came in we handed her the questions. She looked the piece of paper and then looked back at us and then looked back to the paper as if to ask "what the heck am I supposed to do with this?"
She never did glance at the content but rather spent the next hour gossiping with her hair and makeup people as they put her face in order. We actually had to read her the questions to her before she answered them... without of course really answering them, in quite the "accomplished politician" style .
Next up was the head-shaven Minatoya who had squeaked onto the council two years previously and had not exactly spent the biennium endearing himself to the electorate, serving as just another "bum" to be thrown out... just like the bum he had replaced.
Minatoya came in ten minutes before his appointed time to receive the questions and when we told him that, to be fair, we had to wait until exactly one hour before his taping time to give him the questions, he proceeded to stare at his watch for the next 10 minutes like he was waiting for the priest to arrive for last rites.
When we finally gave him the paper he began to look it over like it was his death warrant. What had previously been a trickle of perspiration now began flowing from his chrome-dome by the barrel-full. We didn't take a lot of notice and continued to yack about nothing in particular until Minatoya jumped up and, loud enough for them to hear him at the nearby Lydgate Park Pavilion, screamed "SHUT UP- I'VE ONLY GOT AN HOUR."
Needless to say by "showtime" Minatoya looked like he'd stepped out of a dunking booth. He stumbled his way through his answers, lost the election (some say because of the performance which played for months on public access TV) and was never heard from again on Kaua`i- until now.
Anyway, now we wait for the other shoe to drop as Bynum plots his revenge against Iseri, who has been busy lawyering-up over budget-related as well as other questions the council has over her P.O.H.A.K.U. program and other assorted sordid activities.
The council met in secret executive session on Wednesday regarding P.O.H.A.K.U. and next Wednesday will discuss it in public although the effect on Iseri's budget- which goes to public hearing next Wednesday at 5 p.m.- may be negligible in an election year since "dollar-funding" the entire Office of the Prosecutor (OPA) isn't really an option.
By the way, we just can't let this go without noting how hilarious it is that other island media have- due to a well established hatred of Bynum over the transient vacation rental issue- credited Councilmember JoAnn Yukimura with leading the investigative battle to reveal Iseri's "alleged" crimes.
The fact is that Yukimura has actually been serving as a mouthpiece for Bynum's research into Iseri's activities, but because Bynum wouldn't exactly be the best front-man for any public interrogation, Yukimura, to her credit, as taken up the reigns of the fight to publicize Iseri's shenanigans.
But the real news this week is the sudden departure of the local newspaper's "new" editor Renee Haines. We hear she was fired, not because she was censoring huge swaths of copy filed by her less-than-competent staff regarding Shaylene-related scandals and instead running fluff pieces Iseri gave her.
The publisher could care less about that and might have even been ordering it. They don't really care about much as long as the Happy Camper's column isn't printed blurry.
But apparently Haines had so little news savvy after coming over from the advertising side of the newspaper business that, as a fake newsperson, she personally wrote and published a fake story from fake marine biologist named Terry Lilley- who works for fake-everything Hanalei boatyard owner Mike Sheehan- and Lilley's fake "toxic levels of heavy metals in Hanalei Bay" report- all without checking with anyone as to what the truth is.
But if the local paper is a joke, the real joke is of course the Honolulu Star-Advertiser which has yet to say a word about the whole Iseri-Bynum brouhaha. That may be changing after Bynum's attorney Dan Hempey sent out a press release regarding Watanabe's ruling yesterday. But the joke may be about to become a shaggy dog story because the reporter assigned to the neighbor islands, Rosemary "No Dateline" Bernardo, has apparently yet to set foot on a neighbor island for a story, preferring to file her stories from the S-A's city desk.
We just love this place. Even bending over the toilet, it's endlessly entertaining.
We'll be posting whenever we can.
Eat your fiber kiddies.
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