SchMUSINGS

SchMUSINGS: It was actually a dark and stormy night. The rain was harder than the two feet in three days last weekend and hail was pelting the window so hard it woke us up. But we don't have dogs to walk, the electricity was off and the last time we saw the dawn- or even got up, got out of bed and went outside in the dark- was probably 30 years ago when seeing the sunrise was a result of an all-nighter. So we grabbed another blanket and some ear plugs, rolled over and went back to sleep.

Our apologies to Joan Conrow but since we're going to flit around and do it between games today it seems an appropriate way to commence.

First comes the news that former local Kaua`i newspaper editor Nathan Eagle, the other half of the dynamic duo, has landed a gig with his former cohort, joining ace reporter Mike Levine at Civil Beat.

No surprise on this end since whenever, against all odds, our local paper ends up mysteriously hiring someone even halfway competent, they eventually leave for a real publication. But congrats to CB and Nathan. We can only hope that maybe with two (count 'em two) ex-Kaua`i residents CB will treat Kaua`i like we exist.

Better news on the medical marijuana front. SB 2262 which "clarifies that the medical use of marijuana is considered to be consistent with the Pain Patients' Bill of Rights" has passed the senate and first reading in the house. Passage of the bill will mean that chronic pain patients will now have the right to receive medical marijuana in addition to all other appropriate medications.

That is coupled with the death of House Bill 1963 which was the horrendous effort courtesy of Assistant Director of the Department of Public Safety Keith Kamita- an effort also backed by Kaua`i Prosecutor Shaylene Iseri Carvalho- that would have actually removed chronic pain as a condition for which medical marijuana could be recommended. HB 1963 miraculously didn't get a hearing scheduled by the house Judiciary Committee.

Of course in the "now you see it now you don't" Hawai`i State Legislature, nothing is ever approved until it actually gets signed into law and nothing is ever-ever-ever really dead.

Then, from the "shocked-shocked" file, according to Civil Beat, Kaua`i State Senator Ron Kouchi has jumped on the ethically-bankrupt, legalized-bribery bandwagon by holding a Honolulu fundraiser during the legislative session. Last Night's soiree was a hundred-bucks-a-head affair held at the Mandalay restaurant.

Some states ban the practice of holding fund-raisers during a legislative session. But of course in catch-me-if-you-can-Hawai`i, legislators routinely cash in by holding these events in the hopes of scooping up some cash from those who have an interest in seeing the recipient's vote go a certain way on certain soon-to-be-considered bills. Since quid pro quo's are hard if not impossible to prove it's a practice that is looked upon with disgust by good governance and campaign reform mavens everywhere.

The fundraiser by-the-by is being organized by former Kaua`i Deputy County Attorney Harrison Kawate who worked under perennially county-government-employed former County Attorney Lani Nakazawa. We could go on with many more revolving door connections but the next game is starting soon.

Last but certainly not least is the latest dust up involving our always bafflingly buffoonish Prosecutor, the aforementioned reefer-madness adherent, Shaylene Iseri Carvalho.

Those who missed the real story behind the vague coverage in the local newspaper of the horse-abuse case will want to check in with the aforementioned Joan Conrow and read her coverage beginning last Friday.

Seems dear Shay actually threatened to use her prosecutorial discretion to drop the infamous animal cruelty case because one of the animal control officers at Kaua`i Human Society (KHS) got into a dust up with one of Shay's cousin over a complaint about the cousin's barking dogs and then his lack of dog licenses. Shay claimed the officer was trespassing and is a habitual liar whose testimony in the horse case would be unreliable, so Iseri wanted KHS to fire her.

It's a lot more juicy than that so read Joan's coverage.

But Iseri is back this week with more questionable behavior in a series of emails received by most of the attorneys on Kaua`i regarding the formation of a "Kaua'i Bar Bench Committee"- a "working group of attorneys [formed to] discuss and present issues to our judges [regarding] matters pertaining to judicial administration" according to one local attorney.

The group is being put together through the efforts of local attorney Rosa Flores who, after apparently putting in hours of volunteer time on behalf of the "Kaua`i Bar," innocently sent the following email confirming the "members" of the group, apparently "BCCing" almost all of the attorneys on Kaua`i

Subject: Re: KBA Bench Bar Committee Members

Hi Everyone,

I am very happy to announce the Bench Bar Committee Members. We are very fortunate to have had such an amazing amount of interest and support in the creation of this Committee.

Civil (Circuit Court): Dan Hempey
Collections (District Court): Tim Tobin
Landlord/Tenant, Self-Help Center, Legal Aid, Indigent Services: Emiko Meyers
Criminal Defense: June Ikemoto
Family Law: Caren Dennemeyer
Public Defenders: revolving
Prosecutors Office: revolving/unknown
County Attorneys: Justin Kollar
KBA President/Chair: Rosa Flores
KBA Vice-President/Vice-Chair: Shauna Cahill

The private attorneys on the Committee all wear many hats with various specialties, so we'll have a great overlap in coverage at all times. Please feel free to direct concerns, inquiries, comments, etc. that you would like to bring to the attention of our judges to the Committee member representing your particular area of interest. Everyone is also welcome to direct any inquiries to myself or Shauna Cahill anytime.

Committee Members, I will be in touch soon with all of you.

Thank you,
Rosa

This seemingly pleasant note, apparently following a lot of hard work on Flores' part, elicited a disturbing response from Iseri addressed Flores and CCed to around 75 local attorneys (with the original email in the thread) as well as the Kaua`i judges.

Subject: Re: KBA Bench Bar Committee Members

Aloha Rosa,

It would have been considerate of you to have contacted our office to inquire who would be the representative for the OPA because I would have told you clearly, that it would be me. Please put my name down as the representative of our office.

Shay

Okey-dokey. Apparently because the email was sent to the entire Kaua`i bar, Flores felt compelled to reply to the content and the tone of Iseri's response. She wrote:

Talk about a slap in the face for the best of intentions. Thank you for everyone else for their support in this endeavor, and to the volunteer representatives who took the initiative to contact me.

But Iseri wasn't done with Flores and, CCing the other, wrote back:

We did contact you. Your response is very unprofessional.

Unprofessional? Flores had had just about enough and felt she had to set the record straight. She wrote back saying:

As you very well know, I responded to you directly last week following your assertion that your agency should be represented, and in my response I agreed that your agency should be represented. No mention was made from you as to who would be the representative, and I do not have the time to hunt down attorneys from every possible section to see who is willing to attend the meetings. Yours was not the only agency which did not have name for their rep, but they were nonetheless indicated as being part of the committee.

If anyone else is offended that I did not put their names, please know that it was not intentional; my psychic mind-reading skills are not developed to the point at which I would like them to be. And I apologize for yet another unprofessional response from me.

Not having appeared rude and offensive enough Iseri first wrote:

It definitely is another unprofessional response.

finally adding

I also do not want to be a party to anymore unprofessional emails

Finally Flores realized who she was dealing with and ended the futile conversation by stating

Duly noted. Thank you and God Bless!

Isn't this an election year? Seems everyone knows that but Shaylene.

THE CONTADINA CONSPIRACY

THE CONTADINA CONSPIRACY: This week is commonly known as "are you insane?" week. Okay no it's not... we made that up. So sue us.

But it's a different March Madness that is driving us batty, not the one that has been- and will be- absorbing all of our time and keeping the care and feeding of this beast to a minimum.

It's "Crossover" week at the state legislature when, every year, there are a number of Frankensteinian, "what could you possibly be thinking" bills that have actually passed either the house or senate and are "still alive"... and about to be considered by the power-drunk, disconnected-from-reality officials on the other side (certainly not "our" side) of the lege.

But this year the sheer number if not the content of a passel of piss-poor provisions- ones seemingly designed to eliminate all environmental and land use protections in the name of "economic development"- can only be the product of a group of truly warped, if not criminally corrupted, minds.

We were going nuts over which was more important- this week's conference tournaments or compiling a list of these bills and giving a brief explanation of each... maybe even come up with an algorithm of the precise angle and number of times we should bang our head against the wall.

It was looking like the latter was losing out to that soothing sound of sneakers screeching on gym floors.

But wouldn't you know darn it- you're in luck.

Eleven term State Representative Cynthia Thielen- a Republican of all things and the ranking member of the House Energy and Environmental Protection, Water, Land and Ocean Resources and Judiciary Committees- has penned a handy-dandy guide to what she calls the "Dirty 8 (that) Erode Three Decades Of Landmark Environmental Law," as published in yesterday's "Civil Beat."

In her tome she lists the bills that have "crossed over," describing each and prefaced by the history of how the Hawai`i Environmental Protect Act (HRS § 343) and Shoreline Management Area legislation (HRS § 205A) came to be law.

She writes that :

our State Legislature is ignoring what this body established over three decades ago by now passing legislation that exempts government projects from this public environmental review process. This includes exemptions for government departments and agencies with long track records of being in violation of this landmark law, such as the Department of Transportation (think back to the lawsuit against DOT's H-3). This is a sad day for our public, and it brings shame to our Legislature.

Uh, we might have mentioned the SuperFerry instead but why quibble.

Thielen goes into greater detail and for how diabolical these eight pieces of crap really are and we urge you to read it in full... if you really want to get infuriated that is.

But, somewhat truncated, here they are:

1) HB530 is perhaps the worst of the Dirty 8 as it gives the Office of Planning the ability to grant or deny Special Management Area permits and shoreline setback variances for State structures and activities in shoreline areas. HB530 essentially exempts DOT and the Department of Land and Natural Resources (DLNR) from the Coastal Zone Management Act. More specifically, HB530 has the potential to exempt an undersea cable from environmental review.

2) HB2145 is simply titled "Relating to Economic Development" yet it states it is the policy of the State to complete certain key projects by December 31, 2023, such as the undersea, interisland cable and fixed rail.

3) HB2154 endangers Hawaii's shorelines by adding a temporary exemption from the Special Management Area Use and Minor Permit requirements for certain airport development.

4) HB2324 exempts the upgrading and new construction of broadband facilities on State and County property from State and County permitting processes.

5) HB2325 requires the State and Counties to approve, approve with modification, or disapprove all broadband related permits within 45 days. If no action is taken, the application will be approved on the 46th day. This bill allows for automatic approval of projects without first considering their impact.

6) HB2611 (and its Senate companion SB2873) temporarily amends Chapter 343, HRS, to clarify current EIS exemptions for certain secondary actions. The Department of Transportation sought the exemptions instead of seeking the Environmental Council's approval for secondary action exemptions on highway projects.

7) HB2613 exempts the Department of Transportation, Harbors Division from the permit and site plan approval requirements relating to submerged lands within the State land use conservation district, which contains important natural resources essential to the preservation of the State's fragile natural ecosystems and sustainability of the State's water supply.

8) HB2690 streamlines the geothermal development process by exempting all exploration and drilling from any environmental review, allowing such activity in all State land use districts and conservation district zones and repealing geothermal resource subzone provisions under State land use law.

She concludes by saying

As the Dirty 8 bills move swiftly through the Legislature, we are in danger of rewriting our legacy of environmental law by exempting projects from the specific environmental review processes which protect our vital natural and cultural resources and ensure our economic stability. These bills ignore decades of law introduced by Hawaii's esteemed leaders and environmental pioneers, and threaten the integrity of Hawaii's environment and the prosperity of its people. Instead of tearing down environmental protections and reversing laudable statutes, we should be heeding the wisdom of our predecessors and ensuring a viable future for generations.

If you want to help kill the beast where it lives, tracking bills is easier than ever. Have you pitchfork and torch at hand and go to the Capitol web site Once there enter the house bill (HB) number at the top on the left where it says "Bill Status/Measure Status." That will let you know what the number of the senate version (SB) is- once it is given one.

Then, when it says (at the bottom of the status page) that a hearing has been scheduled you can click on the "Submit Testimony" button which takes you to a page where you can do just that.

If you can't wait you can email all the senators at sens@capitol.hawaii.gov or all representatives at reps@capitol.hawaii.gov . Although tracking the bill and submitting testimony when it is scheduled is said to be more effective it's incredibly difficult and time consuming especially when you're opposing things like eight lousy tomatoes shoved up our little bitty cans- and especially since hearings only have 48 hour notices, even less if they don't feel like it.

Be back Monday.

Go 'Cuse.

PRAISE THE SPEAKER AND PASS THE COMPAZINE

PRAISE THE SPEAKER AND PASS THE COMPAZINE: As we enter our fifth year of "daily" whatever-the-heck-it-is-we-do in this space (changing the definition of "daily" on the fly, first to "week"days and later to whenever-the-heck we feel like it), we noticed that, while some years we tend to bang our head against the wall of the annual state legislative session more than others, this year?.. not so much.

Now don't get us wrong- we usually have little or no trouble getting our boxers in a bunch for the next big fight. The trouble is we're so damn tired of fighting the last one again and again.

Our legislative system has to be one of the most "corrupt" in the country. By that we mean that it's essentially based on a politically-motivated, mutual hand-washing type of cronyism and legalized bribery. This year there was a bill floating around that would have literally legalized "gifts" meant to influence legislators.

It's like a bento that comes with a heaping portion of our absurd "committee-chair-as-God" bill-referral system and two scoops of an "it's-always-this-way-unless-it's-not" rules and procedures, all slathered in the gravy of a hurry-up-and-wait, fake-you-out-of-your-Nikes slew of often-unannounced hearings culminating in a series of conference committees at session's end that make the previous four months of kabuki a bad and expensive joke on those picking up the check.

So the past week or so, as yet another effort to remove all environmental protections from the Hawai`i Environmental Protection Act (HRS 343) moved forward- this time in a measure to arbitrarily allow the governor and/or mayors to exempt anything their black little hearts desire from, not just environmental protection, but from any and all permitting that might trigger public hearings or even add conditions- we just couldn't whip up the outrage of past years' efforts at similar mahttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.giflfeasance.

Thankfully this morning we awoke to a Facebook posting from former Kaua`i State Senator and current state Director of the Office of Environmental Quality Control, Gary Hooser. Fortunately Hooser is now in a position where it is his job to read through stacks of bills, many of which the environmental watchdogs might miss because of course they're not titled "Related to Rape of the Environment" but rather, as in this case, "Relating To Economic Revitalization."

After sending out an alarm last week as to the scheduling of a hearing yesterday, today Hooser wrote that:

HB1893 was "deferred" in the House Finance Committee which means it is most likely dead for this session! This of course is great news for those who care about the environment and preserving public participation in the development process.

Of course another bill, HB2324, which would exempt "the upgrading and new construction of broadband facilities on state and county property from state and county permitting processes" did pass with still-unknown amendments which, the ever optimistic Hooser hopes, "will result in a Bill that is far better than the version that arrived in Finance."

Every year there's another attack. We'd seen them come and go over the year with the worst of the worst, like "automatic approvals," creating havoc and leaving communities with monstrous projects and developments that no one wants because, in the case of automatic approvals, some bureaucrat was asleep at the wheel.

But a special place in the legislative Hall of Shame has to go to these outright HRS 343 exemptions for certain department or division projects.

We became aware of these relatively recently when the SuperFerry was triggering pre barf-o-meter nausea.

As word of the Linda Lingle Administration's corrupt little exemption from 343 began to be challenged, we noticed the absence of any county permitting- even a Shoreline Management Area (SMA) permit which always accompanies any project on or near the shore and is required under the federal Coastal Zone Management (CZM) Act.

But after our usual runaround at the planning department (PD)- which, as with all county departments, usually consists of a "click" on the phone whenever we identify ourselves- we finally received a semi-anonymous email from a lower echelon PD cog from sector "R," referring us to an HRS provision that, like one of those pockets in your colon that contain five year old potato skins, contained a particularly disgusting little turd of a law that exempted the entire Harbor Division of the Department of Land and Natural Resources (DLNR) from any and all county permitting.

Upon further review we learned from then-Kaua`i Representative Mina Morita that, though this provision pre-dated her tenure and had little chance of repeal, she had spent a decade or more fighting the same battle, year after year, to defeat bills that would make others, like the Airports Division, similarly exempted.

Of course now people are becoming more aware of these measures and sometimes, miraculously, as with today's "defeat" of HB1893, the bill is at least temporarily squelched until it rears its ugly head at next year's session.

We have no idea whether we'll be able to stomach much coverage of the legislature this year. Oh we may re-rant about the idiotic Council on Revenues (COR) system where they have to prepare the budget not once, not twice but three times as the economic projections change from one pulled from the COR's sleeve to another pulled from their butts at various points before, during or after the session.

Or maybe we'll get our hackles raised by some last minute "plate-lunch" bill with a heaping portion of gut-and-replace and a side order of conference-committee-shenanigans that yields a final day vote on bill that, although it never even got a hearing and was declared dead in January, has now been slipped into a stack of 20 bills that are passed in a matter of 25 seconds.

But don't expect much. We're nauseous enough from the vog blowing though these days, and food is too expensive to lose our lunch over an entrenched legislative process which stands zero chance of getting a gut-and replace treatment of its own.

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DEJA VU ALL OVER AGAIN

DEJA VU ALL OVER AGAIN: It's somewhere between one of those birthday cake candles that can't be blown out and a regenerating fire-breathing dragon that needs slaying on a recurring basis.

This year again, bills that would make it even harder to use one of the safest and most effective pain medications- medical marijuana- are back and are zipping through the state house. Yet the silence among those trying to stop the bad bills and actually expand the program has been deafening.

Efforts to switch oversight from the Department of Public Safety (DPS) to the Department of Health (DOH) are seemingly absent and the continuing abuses of patients and doctors by the DPS have gone at the very least under-reported if not ignored after healthy debate a year ago.

But one doctor, Jim Berg, MD from the Big Island, is trying to fight back.

Berg has become the doctor who has processed the most recommendations for marijuana to patients and, in an open letter to Governor Neil Abercrombie posted last week at Tiffany Edwards Hunt's Big Island Chronicle he details the abuses of the police and DPS.

Although the letter is incredibly long and at times repetitive, it does tell the sad story of how Berg started giving his own patients recommendations- they're not really prescriptions- and, as other doctors were harassed by state and county law enforcement officials they started sending their patients who needed medical marijuana to Berg rather than fight the county and state.

Berg beings by saying to Abercrombie:

I come from the place of deepest respect as a licensed medical doctor in the State of Hawaii. Respect for you, the great peoples of the State of Hawaii, its laws, and respect for my patients. I appeal to your integrity as a politician in power to hear the pleas of patients of Hawaii suffering from severe pain, nausea, muscle spasms, and appetite loss. They would be disqualified and loose their right to use their medical marijuana if current bills HB2600 and HB1963 (SB2606) pass the Hawaii legislature and you sign them into law. Many of my patients told me personally, that you promised them while on the campaign trail for governor, that you would protect their rights given to them as legally registered patients under the current medical marijuana law. You would show your respect for the 90 percent or more of the current patients that would be disqualified by the bills HB2600 and HB1963, if you would promise to veto these bills. On behalf of the patients and doctors involved, I also ask that you repair the State of Hawaii’s administration and enforcement of the medical marijuana program for the patients and doctors, by creating a state system that actually cares its patients.

After detailing many of the local abuses of patients and disinformation campaigns by Hawai`i Island Police Department (HiPD) Berg tells a tale of years of terrorism toward both doctors and patients at the hands of Keith Kamita, the notorious Deputy Director of Public Safety whose outright lies and, as Berg alleges, illegal activities in fighting against medical marijuana are legendary.

Berg writes that:

the ringleader behind the state’s concerted efforts has historically been Mr. Keith Kamita, the current Deputy Director of Public Safety, and the former Director of the Narcotics Enforcement Division since its inception until you recently promoted him. Mr. Kamita has always been personally kind to me directly and has never suggested to me that I was doing something wrong or bad, despite my and my office’s thousands of communications together with him or his office. Yet Mr. Kamita has not been supportive of the medical marijuana program, and I believe he has spearheaded the statewide movement to hinder a patient and doctor’s right to fulfill this law, and he has repeatedly conspired to used his power to put patients and sincere doctors like my colleagues and myself in a false light to get rid of this program. His obligation as a state agent is to support the current law, not conspire against it. Let me provide some more examples of Mr. Kamita’s systematic attempts to not fulfill the medical marijuana law and to overtly enact a plan to restrict patient and doctors’ legal rights.

HB 1963, which has passed various committees and second reading and been referred to the Judiciary Committee,

Updates the law relating to the medical use of marijuana by: (1) requiring the Department of Health to submit a report, including draft legislation, to the Legislature on recommendations to the list of authorized debilitating medical conditions; (2)requiring a separate registration at each principal place of business where an applicant recommends the medical use of marijuana; (3) clarifying definitions with respect to medical use of marijuana; (4) establishing a suspension period for those violating the medical marijuana program conditions; (5) limiting the amount of marijuana that can be possessed at a location; and (6) increasing the penalties for fraudulent misrepresentations about the medical use of marijuana. (HB1963 HD1)

We're a bit under the weather so will leave it here for today. Last year we almost got through bills to not just put regulation of medical marijuana under the DOH but to start up compassion centers where it can be obtained legally- a problem Dr. Berg details in his letter. But Kamita and others, including Kaua`i Prosecuting Attorney Shaylene Iseri-Carvalho, managed to put a last minute nail in medical marijuana reform's coffin through a campaign of blatant disinformation and fear-mongering.

But this year those bills flounder while this one and others that would make things ten times worse are moving through the legislature without an audible peep from medical marijuana advocates.

Those who need marijuana to alleviate pain without opiates need to have people stand up for some sanity. If reading Berg's letter doesn't move people to act perhaps nothing will.

GIVE THAT MAN AN EXPLODING CIGAR

GIVE THAT MAN AN EXPLODING CIGAR: Sometime you've gotta wonder what happens when people start breathing the air around the state capitol when the legislature is in session.

While it seems to imbue many reps and sens with a tone-deafness that often yields bills like this year's slew of anti-ethics measures, such as the one that would have literally legalized bribery, we're talking about the tendency of public interest lobbying groups- the ones supporting things like good governance and environmental protection- to look at a difficult route for good legislation and decide to take the path of least resistance.

So it was bad enough when, as we wrote late last month:

we heard that rather than ban those one-time-use, white, plastic grocery bags like Kaua`i and Maui have done, the bill streaking through the legislature aims to simply put a 10 cent fee on them- to go to 25 cents if it doesn't decrease the use significantly.

At that time we were kvetching about how

the corporate media is framing any controversy over the bill as whether in fact to institute a fee and if so how much it should be, is that our own people have sold us down the river once again.

But to our surprise soon thereafter we received a "Capitol Watch" email from the state Sierra Club (SC) asking us to get behind the effort rather than pushing the type of legislative ban many of us worked hard to institute on Kaua`i, Maui and the Big Island and has now been introduced in Honolulu.

What no one has reported is the behind-the-scenes controversy it caused, not just among SC members but among other organization cited as supporting the bill such as the Surfrider Foundation.

Apparently one of those problems of bi and tri-level organizations hit the fan and the press wasn't interested in making it clear that it was Surfrider's Honolulu chapter that was supporting the fee while others, like the Kaua`i chapter, were holding out for a total ban.

They weren't the only ones who felt like the SC was screwing up. Email overflowed the in-boxes of those who worked for a year or more to pass the bans on the neighbor islands. They were worried that, despite the fact that the original bill would have allowed the county bans to stand, their efforts may have been usurped by one of those all-too-common, last-minute, conference committee switcheroos.

But despite all the buzz, apparently the word hadn't reached the SC's desk as they announced that "A Bill’s Death Leaves Citizens Stunned"

The piece said that:

in a surprising and astonishing move, HB 2260 was recommitted, and in a casual vocal floor vote, the single-use bag and watershed initiative fund bill experienced a swift death on the House floor, rendering it impossible for the bill to pass the First Lateral deadline. We’re not sure why this occurred, but the move was completely unexpected and came as a shock to its ample and optimistic supporters.

Astonishing? Surprising? Stunned?

How about Tone-deaf. Out of Touch. Oblivious.

While the death of the "fee" bill has been characterized as "a mistake" by some there is evidence it may have been anything but.

Maybe no one at SC noticed that Honolulu City Council Chair Ernie Martin has introduced and a bill that would ban single use plastic bags which, if it passes, would create a de facto state-wide ban by virtue of having bans in all four counties. If they had surly it would have alerted them that their piddly little fee-instituting bill was hopelessly out-stripped by current events.

But even without the Honolulu measure how far did they think they would get without the support of those who on the three neighbor islands?

These citizens prevailed in the face of big money being poured into the state by the national chemical industry which air-lift in lobbyists to unsuccessfully try to convince three sets of councilmembers that it was an issue of "choice"... that people should be free to "choose" to create visual land blights, turn the ocean into a death trap for aquatic life and further contribute to the ever-growing Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

Did they think we were now going to give up and support a half-assed "fee" bill?

The Sierra Club does great work and without their lobbying efforts we probably wouldn't even have a Hawai`i Environmental Protection Act any more- something they are trying to again prevent from happening this year again.

But when they do things like this by deciding to start off supporting a weak bill- not to mention one that many of their members view as wholly inadequate and possibly destructive of activists' previous efforts- it might be wise to examine, not why the "fee" bill was voted down but exactly why they shocked in the first place when it happened.

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As you can probably tell from the above we're still in need of a new editor. If you have some experience- or even if you are just literate and can tell when it's its and when it's it's- and can determine if that phrase is "clear as mud" or "clear like mud"- and can spare a spell to check our spelling and such sometime around noon on weekdays, email us at gotwindmills(at)gmail.com. It would also help if you're familiar with local names, places and political machinations.

We can't offer recompense beyond the satisfaction of dealing with an impossibly demanding crazy person but we're still hopeful that there's someone equally insane out there somewhere.

JUST A MOTION AWAY

JUST A MOTION AWAY: Our high school Economics class had us bored to tears. For a red diaper baby in the midst of the late 60's "revolution" it held little relevance. But we do remember one thing- the way Mr. Voorhies would ask questions of our equally narcoleptic classmates and, when no one raised their hands, he would rub his thumb across his other four fingers, indicating the inevitable answer to every question in economics... money.

Perhaps it has stuck with us because every time we see the Hawai`i State Legislature, or any legislative body in the country for that matter, propose some inane and out-of-touch piece of legislation- many times either in opposition to pervasive public opinion or presenting a version of the ideal that is so watered-down you can actually hear it gurgling as it goes down for the third time- we leap to the conclusion that the answer as to "why" can be summed up with Mr. Voorhies' gesture.

So when we heard that rather than ban those one-time-use, white, plastic grocery bags like Kaua`i and Maui have done, the bill streaking through the legislature aims to simply put a 10 cent fee on them- to go to 25 cents if it doesn't decrease the use significantly.

At first blush we assume it was, as usual, the "money in the system" from both the supermarkets and plastic bag makers that was the proverbial fly in the ointment.

But the reality is that the reason why the corporate media is framing any controversy over the bill as whether in fact to institute a fee and if so how much it should be, is that our own people have sold us down the river once again.

Rather than look at how incredibly beautiful the roadsides, beaches and, everything else looks on Kaua`i and Maui now that everything isn't draped in white plastic and advocate for a total ban statewide, according to Civil Beat:

Sierra Club director Robert Harris told the House Committee on Energy and Environmental Protection Thursday that a fee — which would be charged to consumers at the checkout counter — has worked to reduce plastic bag use in other areas.

Harris was among those testifying on House Bill 2260. Environmental groups, including The Nature Conservancy and Surfrider Foundation, as well as government department heads and even major supermarkets, testified in support of the bill.

The important part that tells you something is wrong is that last part- it wasn't just the environmental group but "even major supermarkets, testified in support of the bill."

Now we get the "strange bedfellows" aspect of politics. Many times we have to question our own sanity when we find ourselves agreeing on some issue with various and sundry fascists, war mongers and general all-around creeps and cretins.

But that isn't the case here.

Way too often, especially in "the Aloha State," those who put themselves out as allies in the fight to stop despoilment in the name of progress in the islands abandon the fight to enact effective legislation in favor of compromising our environment before the fight even begins.

The thought process, as we've been told in similar circumstances in the past, is that the good fight isn't worth fighting this time. We've been admonished by the leadership of the above listed groups that certain battles aren't worth fighting and scoring political points for the organization on "this one" is more important than staking out the "perfect" so that the final "good" will be just a little better when all is said and done.

The way politics is supposed to work is that you stake out your perfect position and either win over the other side or find a happy medium. But lately- whether it's the Hawai`i environmental groups or the national Democratic Party, the position taken going into negotiations is already compromised to the extent that the final measure is inevitably horrific.

It isn't the money itself in many of these situations. Rather it's the acknowledging- and therefore condoning- of the fear from legislators over the use of that money to challenge them at election time that creates the defeatist attitude of progressive organizations these days.

Yes- getting all money out of politics is the ultimate solution to our broken political system. But if we give up before we begin, we're giving that money exponentially more power than it already has.

CHOKE ON IT

CHOKE ON IT: If those who treat terminal illnesses with humor really want to get some belly laughs, they might do well to bring in tapes of the last two Kaua`i County Council sessions.

No, this time it wasn't the council itself that provided the guffaws but some of the Genetically Modified Organism (GMO) industry lobbyists and their poor, confused sycophants who traipsed up to testify.

One of our favorite bit of professed balderdash is that we don't need labeling because "no one has gotten sick from GMOs," which would be a neat trick since it might just make it difficult to know of something made you sick if you didn't know you were eating it.

Actually there have been very few studies of heath effects- zero independently conducted ones that we can find- with the oft quoted numbers of studies of GMOs being primarily on the growing of them and far less than 10% on any health effects.

But perhaps the most side-splitting of all absurdities is from those who tried to intimidate the council into rejecting support for a measure to ask the state legislature to initiate labeling of GMO products, as we mentioned a week or so back.

You could see the actual fear on Kauai and Hawai`i state Farm Bureau stalwart Jerry Ornellas's face as he described the scenario that he had been convinced was the future under a Hawai`i law requiring labeling. He described how soon, farmers would be sitting around, first presumably with test tubes and centrifuges to determine if their food contained GMOs and then whipping out the stickers and laundry marking pen and writing out their own labels.

People such as Scott MacFarlaine of the Chamber of Commerce and others had convinced poor "Farmer Jerry" that it would be up to him and perhaps retailers to do this, turning the issue into not one of health but one of "get the government off the backs of small business."

Even though recently states like California have started petition efforts to get their legislature to pass labeling laws and others have begun to consider introducing such legislation, the local produce defilers are apparently going to rely on a divide and conquer strategy that presumes the internet was never invented.

The council didn’t help much with this with every one of them questioning whether the state could really do this in the first place. Doesn't the FDA have jurisdiction and haven't they banned states and local jurisdictions from passing labeling laws?

Well the bad news used to be yes. Until this past July, the FDA has said they were solely responsible for any move toward labeling and when the chief lobbyist from Monsanto was appointed head of the FDA it didn't look good.

But the recent good news is that, according to Consumers International, the world federation of consumer groups,

In a striking reversal of their previous position, on Tuesday, during the annual Codex (Alimentarius) summit in Geneva, the US delegation dropped its opposition to the GM labeling guidance document, allowing it to move forward and become an official Codex text.

The new Codex agreement means that any country wishing to adopt GM food labeling will no longer face the threat of a legal challenge from the World Trade Organization (WTO). This is because national measures based on Codex guidance or standards cannot be challenged as a barrier to trade.

What that means in the US is that, as a signatory of the Codex and member of the World Trade Organization, the federal FDA can no longer ban labeling.

The article cites examples like Peru where

recent introduction of GM food labeling faced the threat of a legal challenge from the WTO. This new Codex agreement now means that this threat has gone and the consumer right to be informed has been secured.

...and in Africa where

Samuel Ochieng, President Emeritus of Consumers International and CEO of the Consumer Information Network of Kenya said:

"While the agreement falls short of the consumer movement's long-held demand for endorsement of mandatory GM food labeling, this is still a significant milestone for consumer rights. We congratulate Codex on agreeing on this guidance, which has been sought by consumers and regulators in African countries for nearly twenty years. This guidance is extremely good news for the worlds' consumers who want to know what is in the foods on their plates". (sic)

Now we don't expect all the conspiracy nutcases- who have tried to turn the Codex Alimentarius into a satanic field manual instead of an international standard for safety and efficacy of drugs and things like vitamins- to give up. You'll recognize them by their "don't take away our vitamins" mantra having been duped into not realizing that their little movement is funded and directed by the evil "Big Pharma" itself so they don't have to test their now unregulated vitamins and supplements.

But this does "solve" the mystery of what exactly happened this summer to allow the states to pass their own legislation regarding GMO labeling.

As to the Hawai`i effort, even though apparently the Kaua`i County Council will join Maui in their support for a state-wide labeling bill, since the measure is part of the Hawai`i State Association of Counties' (HSAC) legislative package, all county councils must sign off on it and, if the Honolulu committee vote is any indication, it's not going to pass there.

That means that the Hawai`i GMO labeling movement will most likely be moving on to the next phase- finding support in the legislature.

The first thing is to find two legislators- one in the house and one in the senate- to introduce the bills. And then the fun begins.

It is never too early to start soliciting support for the measure among legislators. The earlier the support the more likely the bill will get a kind ear from the leadership of the two bodies and get referrals to committees that have supportive chairs and, conversely, not get referred to those committees that have chairs who are close to the industry.

For those on Kaua`i who might have the attention of our four legislators- Senator Ron Kouchi, Representatives Derek Kawaikami, Jimmy Tokioka or Dee Morikawa- it can't hurt to try to pin them down on their public positions on GMO labeling now.

The council will be taking a final vote on Wednesday and the stronger the showing of support the more likely it is to get noticed by state legislators... in an election year. If people can't sit around all day and wait for it to come up on the agenda the council now allows people to speak right at 9 a.m. on any agenda topic. And written testimony can be submitted via email at counciltestimony@kauai.gov .

The Codex Alimentarius Commission decision means nothing if those who have thrown up their hands in frustrated despair for the past decade or so don't act, whether here in Hawai`i or in other states.

We'll miss the non-sequiturs and ridiculously convoluted scare tactics of the GMO industry but we'll always have Marx Brothers movies.