SEEING- AND HEARING- IS BELIEVING: For some reason we seem to have become the clearinghouse for people calling to find out why the heck recent cablecasts of council meetings look like they were done by an aggregation of orangutans using the very first video cameras ever made.
"What the heck is with Ho`ike this time" they scream into the phone, regarding what most assume is yet another incompetent screwup by the Kaua`i public access TV outlet.
The video looks like a 10th generation re-dub and the audio sounds like it was recorded in a bathtub ever since the council moved back into the Historic County Building and the "automatic" system they had installed during the renovation was fired up.
And that's when it worked. Last week's meeting was pure torture to view with the sound of 120-decibel white noise accompanying the wide view of the panel, and the rest, when it was audible at all, was recorded at barely a whisper.
But after talking to Ho`ike Managing Director J Robertson this morning, we discovered what we suspected all along- for once Ho`ike isn't to blame.
And starting tomorrow if all goes well the "new" automated, voice-activated recording system will be scrapped in favor of the old human-driven cameras and recording devices with a real live director, Bill "BC" Charles, at the helm.
According to Robertson, he met with Council Chair Jay Furfaro last week and Furfaro has agreed to scrub the new installation that was initiated by former Council Chair Kaipo Asing.
Seems Asing thought that system used in courts was the cat's meow so had it ordered and installed without consulting Robertson or anyone else who understood anything about video.
"It's certainly not broadcast quality" Robertson said, understating the look of the JAVS system and explaining that the cost for decent cameras wouldn't have been very much more.
"I wish they would have worked with us," he said.
But while we had the near-impossible-to-reach Robertson on the phone, we asked another question that has been a matter of discontent for many- why the meetings can't be cablecast live like the rest of the country.
When Time Warner took over the local cable system, they finally finished constructing what is known as the "I-Net" which connects government facilities to the public access's "head end" where they send their signal from.
Roberson said it connects the Historic County Building with the administrative offices in the Round Building and surrounding offices as well as all the fire stations, the police and courts complex, all the county neighborhood centers and schools.
But he says, the reason he can't use it is because the administration has refused to let him have access to the signal from the council and planning and police commission meetings.
He says he tried for years when Erik Knutzen was the county IT chief but that Knutzen told him- as he had told us- that both former Mayor Bryan Baptiste and current Mayor Bernard Carvalho wouldn't let them have the live signal, which has been viewable live in administrative offices for many years now.
Robertson said he talked to Furfaro about using the I-Net to put live meetings on Ho`ike and that Furfaro seemed receptive to the idea of just cutting the administration out as a "middleman" and making the signal available directly from the council to Ho`ike.
So are we counting on viewable council meetings beginning tomorrow or live ones in the near future?
What are we- freakin' idiots?
No, that's a question that only someone who has never dealt with the council or Ho`ike would ask expecting a positive response. As usual we'll believe it when we see it.
Showing posts with label What am I- a freakin' idiot?. Show all posts
Showing posts with label What am I- a freakin' idiot?. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Monday, July 25, 2011
SEE HOW THEY RUN
SEE HOW THEY RUN: Try to pull a con-job on a New Yorker and it's likely his- or her- response will be a sneering "what am I- a freakin' idiot?".
But when one examines the ingestion and regurgitation of mindless claptrap that passes for the cranial contents of some of these vapid tea-party-addled denizens of the fly-over states, you just know that an honest response to that same query, would be "indubitably."
But mainlanders have no monopoly on helpfully doling out "two tens for a five" upon request if a story in this morning's Honolulu newspaper is any indication.
The headline "State may sell buildings, then pay developers rent" doesn't even tell the whole story.
Apparently the Brainiacs at the capitol have passed legislation allowing the fiscally-challenged gang at state Department of Accounting and General Services (DAGS) to "sell buildings under its ownership to developers with an agreement by which the developer pays for upgrades and the state pays to rent the improved facilities."
Of course as long as you don't think too much- or at all- about it it sounds like a great deal. But, as the article notes in one of those passive-aggressive passages reporters have designed to give credence to even the most harebrained of ideas:
Concerns have been raised that the law... could end up making it more expensive in the long range to own and maintain buildings, given that developers will need to earn a return on their investment through charging the state rent.
Gee, ya think?
Where exactly do we find one of these saps who think that instead of fixing his broken-down car it would be cheaper to sell it to you and then buy it back for the price you paid plus the amount of the repair bill and then throw in 10% for YOUR trouble?
Well apparently you find at least 49 of these Lady Madonnas in the state house and 25 of them in the senate- and of course one more on the fifth floor- who do indeed think that money is heaven sent.
So who's the real idiot? Well, in New York they say to look all around the room and if you can't find the mark it's because you don't have a mirror handy.
But when one examines the ingestion and regurgitation of mindless claptrap that passes for the cranial contents of some of these vapid tea-party-addled denizens of the fly-over states, you just know that an honest response to that same query, would be "indubitably."
But mainlanders have no monopoly on helpfully doling out "two tens for a five" upon request if a story in this morning's Honolulu newspaper is any indication.
The headline "State may sell buildings, then pay developers rent" doesn't even tell the whole story.
Apparently the Brainiacs at the capitol have passed legislation allowing the fiscally-challenged gang at state Department of Accounting and General Services (DAGS) to "sell buildings under its ownership to developers with an agreement by which the developer pays for upgrades and the state pays to rent the improved facilities."
Of course as long as you don't think too much- or at all- about it it sounds like a great deal. But, as the article notes in one of those passive-aggressive passages reporters have designed to give credence to even the most harebrained of ideas:
Concerns have been raised that the law... could end up making it more expensive in the long range to own and maintain buildings, given that developers will need to earn a return on their investment through charging the state rent.
Gee, ya think?
Where exactly do we find one of these saps who think that instead of fixing his broken-down car it would be cheaper to sell it to you and then buy it back for the price you paid plus the amount of the repair bill and then throw in 10% for YOUR trouble?
Well apparently you find at least 49 of these Lady Madonnas in the state house and 25 of them in the senate- and of course one more on the fifth floor- who do indeed think that money is heaven sent.
So who's the real idiot? Well, in New York they say to look all around the room and if you can't find the mark it's because you don't have a mirror handy.
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
ASKIN’ FOR IT
ASKIN’ FOR IT: It hasn’t just been a kick we’re on lately- that of examining laughably lame and confusingly contentions, slanted statements from bumbling bureaucrats designed to amply appeal to our guileless gullibility.
But it certainly isn’t just here on little Kaua`i where a post plantation populous is too busy beachcombing and bathing to understand unctuous utterances from corrupt capos and cronies.
Behold the corporate actions in the case of the runaway Toyotas whose corporate overlords have apparently set up their own demise by just replacing the gas pedals.
We’ve spent the past few days asking our more mechanically inclined acquaintances, car mavens and repair people who have been following the story and not one- not a single one- believes that fixing the gas pedal alone will stop these cars from having a mind of their own.
One and all believe it has to be the electronic “brain” that they put in cars these days so that any repair at all starts at $1000 and can only be done at the dealership.
In that sense it was inevitable that those chickens would come home to roost and they would become so complicated that even they can’t figure out what’s wrong with their own Frankencoupés.
If you’ve been following this debacle you’ll know that Toyota has spent months- actually years now- trying to figure out why on occasion their cars accelerate but then won’t stop doing so.
First they said it was the floor mats, then it was something with the gas pedal. Meanwhile most who independently looked at it concluded that it had to be something in the computer electronics that control acceleration.
But when the feds told them to fix it NOW, in a “that’s our story and we’re sticking with it” manner they’ve settled on putting in new gas pedals in millions of cars and denying that it’s anything more in a move seemingly destined to destroy any future for the company when it continues to happen.
The hastily concocted explanation for what’s supposedly wrong with the pedal mechanism doesn’t even make sense. It basically says that due to “wear and tear” the mechanism sticks where two pieces come together, But if something “wears” it wears down not up and its not going to stick, rather it’s going to become looser, according what a couple of engineers told us last night after the “explanation” was given by Toyota.
So why should we care if corporate malfeasance brings down a car company other than the gazillion of manufacturing jobs?
It’s simply the other side of the corporate personhood that’s on many people’s minds after the US Supreme court humanized them for purposes pumping more money into elections.
Because while this personhood extends to elections it doesn’t extend to corporate wrongdoing and responsibility. Don’t forget, it’s people who are making the decision to do this without regard to the fact that it will almost assuredly blow up in their faces in a year or so once the crashes continue and we figure out that the “fix” fixes nothing.
But don’t expect anyone to be punished for that. If anything happens to Toyota it will be because no one will buy one, not because the company is arrested and tried for murder.
But by the time anyone figures it out the same executives that made the decision to do this will no doubt have passed the hot potato to another ambitious young executive, received their golden parachute and gone on to bigger and better corporate criminal capers.
If you live on Kaua`i and own a newish Toyota and are headed down to the dealership for your “fix” and are then planning on driving off as if nothing is wrong you’re probably the same person who believed that the new alignment of the bike path isn’t going to be on Wailua Beach and that the $7.5 million the county paid in the Ka Loko Dam tragedy settlement wasn’t due to culpability.
So we’ve just gotta ask you – what are you, a freakin’ idiot?
But it certainly isn’t just here on little Kaua`i where a post plantation populous is too busy beachcombing and bathing to understand unctuous utterances from corrupt capos and cronies.
Behold the corporate actions in the case of the runaway Toyotas whose corporate overlords have apparently set up their own demise by just replacing the gas pedals.
We’ve spent the past few days asking our more mechanically inclined acquaintances, car mavens and repair people who have been following the story and not one- not a single one- believes that fixing the gas pedal alone will stop these cars from having a mind of their own.
One and all believe it has to be the electronic “brain” that they put in cars these days so that any repair at all starts at $1000 and can only be done at the dealership.
In that sense it was inevitable that those chickens would come home to roost and they would become so complicated that even they can’t figure out what’s wrong with their own Frankencoupés.
If you’ve been following this debacle you’ll know that Toyota has spent months- actually years now- trying to figure out why on occasion their cars accelerate but then won’t stop doing so.
First they said it was the floor mats, then it was something with the gas pedal. Meanwhile most who independently looked at it concluded that it had to be something in the computer electronics that control acceleration.
But when the feds told them to fix it NOW, in a “that’s our story and we’re sticking with it” manner they’ve settled on putting in new gas pedals in millions of cars and denying that it’s anything more in a move seemingly destined to destroy any future for the company when it continues to happen.
The hastily concocted explanation for what’s supposedly wrong with the pedal mechanism doesn’t even make sense. It basically says that due to “wear and tear” the mechanism sticks where two pieces come together, But if something “wears” it wears down not up and its not going to stick, rather it’s going to become looser, according what a couple of engineers told us last night after the “explanation” was given by Toyota.
So why should we care if corporate malfeasance brings down a car company other than the gazillion of manufacturing jobs?
It’s simply the other side of the corporate personhood that’s on many people’s minds after the US Supreme court humanized them for purposes pumping more money into elections.
Because while this personhood extends to elections it doesn’t extend to corporate wrongdoing and responsibility. Don’t forget, it’s people who are making the decision to do this without regard to the fact that it will almost assuredly blow up in their faces in a year or so once the crashes continue and we figure out that the “fix” fixes nothing.
But don’t expect anyone to be punished for that. If anything happens to Toyota it will be because no one will buy one, not because the company is arrested and tried for murder.
But by the time anyone figures it out the same executives that made the decision to do this will no doubt have passed the hot potato to another ambitious young executive, received their golden parachute and gone on to bigger and better corporate criminal capers.
If you live on Kaua`i and own a newish Toyota and are headed down to the dealership for your “fix” and are then planning on driving off as if nothing is wrong you’re probably the same person who believed that the new alignment of the bike path isn’t going to be on Wailua Beach and that the $7.5 million the county paid in the Ka Loko Dam tragedy settlement wasn’t due to culpability.
So we’ve just gotta ask you – what are you, a freakin’ idiot?
Friday, January 22, 2010
LAPPIN’ IT RIGHT UP
LAPPIN’ IT RIGHT UP: Intellectuals and philosophy mavens can spend hours in sophomoric sophistry asking each other the question “if a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it does it make a sound?”.
Let us clue you in- of course it freakin’ does... what are you a freakin’ moron?” (it seems to be that kind of week).
The ease with which people are bamboozled and bewildered comes to mind because what nobody seems to want to admit in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision allowing corporations to flood elections with cash is that if Americans weren’t too-stupid-to-live and as easily swayed as the mythical soundless trees they wouldn’t be influenced by all the bogus, distracting advertising bought by company capital.
So which is it? Are “American voters are smart enough to see though all the nonsense” as some suck-up pols suggest? Or is it that “you can never underestimate the intelligence of the American voter.”
Only the silent tree toppling proponents could pick the former.
But what can you expect from a country that can’t tell that a “person” is a flesh and blood human being and not a piece of paper with the words “corporate charter” written on it?
Corporate personhood goes back to an 1886 Supreme Court Case, Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad and this absurd notion is behind yesterday’s Orwellian “free speech for those who can’t speak” piece of true fascist flack.
Many in the progressive movement are busy today promoting a narrow constitutional amendment dealing with banning corporate cash in elections but a small cadre including Howard Zinn, Bill Moyer, Tom Hayden, Jim Hightower, Medea Benjamin and dozens of others have put together a “Move To Amend” web site and petition to “firmly establish... that human beings, not corporations, are persons entitled to constitutional rights”.
But then again to think that a constitutional amendment under what passes for democracy in the USA Inc. is in the realm of reality probably means joining that confederacy of dunces who debates noiseless arboreal thickets.
Let us clue you in- of course it freakin’ does... what are you a freakin’ moron?” (it seems to be that kind of week).
The ease with which people are bamboozled and bewildered comes to mind because what nobody seems to want to admit in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision allowing corporations to flood elections with cash is that if Americans weren’t too-stupid-to-live and as easily swayed as the mythical soundless trees they wouldn’t be influenced by all the bogus, distracting advertising bought by company capital.
So which is it? Are “American voters are smart enough to see though all the nonsense” as some suck-up pols suggest? Or is it that “you can never underestimate the intelligence of the American voter.”
Only the silent tree toppling proponents could pick the former.
But what can you expect from a country that can’t tell that a “person” is a flesh and blood human being and not a piece of paper with the words “corporate charter” written on it?
Corporate personhood goes back to an 1886 Supreme Court Case, Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad and this absurd notion is behind yesterday’s Orwellian “free speech for those who can’t speak” piece of true fascist flack.
Many in the progressive movement are busy today promoting a narrow constitutional amendment dealing with banning corporate cash in elections but a small cadre including Howard Zinn, Bill Moyer, Tom Hayden, Jim Hightower, Medea Benjamin and dozens of others have put together a “Move To Amend” web site and petition to “firmly establish... that human beings, not corporations, are persons entitled to constitutional rights”.
But then again to think that a constitutional amendment under what passes for democracy in the USA Inc. is in the realm of reality probably means joining that confederacy of dunces who debates noiseless arboreal thickets.
Monday, January 18, 2010
ANOTHER STEAMING PILE ON THE BIKE PATH
ANOTHER STEAMING PILE ON THE BIKE PATH: When confronted with government snow-jobs we’ve often asked “what are we- a bunch of freakin’ idiots”.
The answer this weekend is apparently yes because somehow many if not most of the people opposing putting the bike path on a boardwalk on Wailua Beach are apparently convinced that the “new alignment”- craftily announced by Mayor Bernard Carvalho and his “brains”, Beth Tokioka- will no longer be on the beach but on the highway.
Apparently that is a bunch of shibai.
The only thing that has changed is that the path will now be a permanent strip of concrete rather than the “removable boardwalk” that was originally put in place because a permanent sidewalk on the beach would have been considered a “hardening of the shoreline” requiring an almost impossible to obtain Army Corps of Engineers permit.
The first step in the misdirection came in the form of the local newspaper’s Friday article faithfully rehashing the carefully written county release.
The headline falsely stated “Mayor shifting path from beach to highway” and the article doesn’t refute that statement.
A careful examination of the county press release shows that it never actually states that the new “alignment” will not be on the beach. And actually, if you read between the lines, it says it will.
The relevant portions of the release says:
(T)he proposed alignment for the Wailua Beach section will be shifted from the beach to the right-of-way on the makai side of Kūhi‘ō Highway...
(T)he mayor told the groups (he met with Friday), “As a result of all of the input we’ve received, I’ve decided to move forward on a makai alignment, keeping the path within the Kūhiō Highway right-of-way.”...
In the new design, the existing rock wall will be removed and a replacement barrier will be constructed as an integral part of the path.
“We are hopeful that this adjustment addresses many of the concerns raised by the community,” said the mayor...
In aligning the path within the highway right-of-way, the path will be constructed of concrete at a depth of just 18 inches, even shallower than that of the adjacent roadway.
“There will be no additional drilling or ‘augers’ required,” said Building Division Superintendent Doug Haigh.
Notice how it sounds like it is going to be where the highway pavement and wall are currently located. Nowhere does it say it will not be on the beach anymore, only that “there will be no additional drilling or ‘augers’ required”.
The article in the local newspaper is careful not to say what the headline does and does not make clear where exactly it will be but it does contain the first hint that all may not be as it appears.
Way down towards the end Mike Levine- who may or may not have written the headline but was not at the Friday meeting where the Mayor announced the “change”, according to participants- reports:
(I)t’s still on the beach,” Judy Dalton said Friday evening.“As long as it’s still on the beach, we feel that the alternate route described in the environmental assessment as one of the three alternatives ... on the canal behind Coco Palms would be the least impactful, environmentally and culturally,” Dalton said.
According to some who attended the meeting Friday at which Carvalho “met with representatives of several Hawaiian groups” according to the county release, the issue of exactly where the path would be was presented in a manner seemingly designed to make the matter “as clear as mud”.
Some of the confusion centered around the use of the word “shoulder” which many took to mean the paved shoulder off the highway itself but still on the paved portion- a “shoulder” currently used for a “bike lane”.
But upon questioning it became apparent that the shoulder the officials were talking about was the “soft” shoulder adjacent to the paved portion defining the “shoulder” they were talking about as “where the pavement ends”.
Another key in the misdirection is that it may well be that the state’s “right of way” is not limited to the paved highway itself with part of it extending onto the beach. Although the exact location is not addressed in either the article or the press release, the “on the right of way” statement has led many to believe that the “right of way” mentioned as the location of the realignment was on the paved highway itself.
Looking at two maps on the county web site is a joke. Both are crisscrossed with seemingly meaningless, unlabeled lines all over the place with no clearly marked “new alignment” much less the old one.
As if to prove the extent to which the public has been duped, a letter to the editor appeared over the weekend from one of those who has been calling on the mayor to change the alignment to get it off the beach.
What with the headline in the paper and the carefully parsed county release it’s understandable that Jimmy Trujillo wrote:
The mayor’s decision to stay off the sand but stay on the roadside is a compromise that warrants support.
It may be one of the few times in the short time I’ve lived on Kaua`i that a government leader has demonstrated any kind of respect to the kupuna leaders and cultural practitioners of the host culture.
The first irony in all this is that a perfectly good bike path exists right now on the makai side of the highway on the pavement- the spot many are erroneously thinking the “new alignment” would put the path.
The problem is that there’s only so much room to put the new four lane highway and for some reason the county has never pursued acquiring land on the mauka “Coco Palms” side of the highway despite the countless permits and extensions issued to the land owners
The second is that the concept of a “removable” boardwalk came about precisely because a permanent concrete sidewalk on the beach would have been an approval nightmare with not just the Army Corp but various state and county agencies who were sold the idea on the basis of a removable boardwalk, not a permanent concrete ribbon.
The county recently passed a bill exempting itself from our “strictest in the nation” shoreline setback laws under some circumstances. Changes in the path should trigger a new “certified shoreline” especially considering that waves commonly deposit sand on the highway during large storms.
Going back to the original unacceptable concrete-on-the-beach idea reminds us of the joke about the guy who eats at Luigi’s Italian restaurant every day and with his meal he is served two slices of Italian bread.
“Luigi” he asks “What’s with the two slices- how come your so stingy with the beard every day”.
The next day Luigi serves him four slices and the man still isn’t happy and wants more. The next day Luigi gives him six and the man still complains.
Finally the next day Luigi takes the whole Italian loaf and slices it down the center the long way and serves it to his customer.
The man looks at Luigi and says “What, Luigi- you’re back to the two slices. eh?”
Can’t anyone here play this game?
The answer this weekend is apparently yes because somehow many if not most of the people opposing putting the bike path on a boardwalk on Wailua Beach are apparently convinced that the “new alignment”- craftily announced by Mayor Bernard Carvalho and his “brains”, Beth Tokioka- will no longer be on the beach but on the highway.
Apparently that is a bunch of shibai.
The only thing that has changed is that the path will now be a permanent strip of concrete rather than the “removable boardwalk” that was originally put in place because a permanent sidewalk on the beach would have been considered a “hardening of the shoreline” requiring an almost impossible to obtain Army Corps of Engineers permit.
The first step in the misdirection came in the form of the local newspaper’s Friday article faithfully rehashing the carefully written county release.
The headline falsely stated “Mayor shifting path from beach to highway” and the article doesn’t refute that statement.
A careful examination of the county press release shows that it never actually states that the new “alignment” will not be on the beach. And actually, if you read between the lines, it says it will.
The relevant portions of the release says:
(T)he proposed alignment for the Wailua Beach section will be shifted from the beach to the right-of-way on the makai side of Kūhi‘ō Highway...
(T)he mayor told the groups (he met with Friday), “As a result of all of the input we’ve received, I’ve decided to move forward on a makai alignment, keeping the path within the Kūhiō Highway right-of-way.”...
In the new design, the existing rock wall will be removed and a replacement barrier will be constructed as an integral part of the path.
“We are hopeful that this adjustment addresses many of the concerns raised by the community,” said the mayor...
In aligning the path within the highway right-of-way, the path will be constructed of concrete at a depth of just 18 inches, even shallower than that of the adjacent roadway.
“There will be no additional drilling or ‘augers’ required,” said Building Division Superintendent Doug Haigh.
Notice how it sounds like it is going to be where the highway pavement and wall are currently located. Nowhere does it say it will not be on the beach anymore, only that “there will be no additional drilling or ‘augers’ required”.
The article in the local newspaper is careful not to say what the headline does and does not make clear where exactly it will be but it does contain the first hint that all may not be as it appears.
Way down towards the end Mike Levine- who may or may not have written the headline but was not at the Friday meeting where the Mayor announced the “change”, according to participants- reports:
(I)t’s still on the beach,” Judy Dalton said Friday evening.“As long as it’s still on the beach, we feel that the alternate route described in the environmental assessment as one of the three alternatives ... on the canal behind Coco Palms would be the least impactful, environmentally and culturally,” Dalton said.
According to some who attended the meeting Friday at which Carvalho “met with representatives of several Hawaiian groups” according to the county release, the issue of exactly where the path would be was presented in a manner seemingly designed to make the matter “as clear as mud”.
Some of the confusion centered around the use of the word “shoulder” which many took to mean the paved shoulder off the highway itself but still on the paved portion- a “shoulder” currently used for a “bike lane”.
But upon questioning it became apparent that the shoulder the officials were talking about was the “soft” shoulder adjacent to the paved portion defining the “shoulder” they were talking about as “where the pavement ends”.
Another key in the misdirection is that it may well be that the state’s “right of way” is not limited to the paved highway itself with part of it extending onto the beach. Although the exact location is not addressed in either the article or the press release, the “on the right of way” statement has led many to believe that the “right of way” mentioned as the location of the realignment was on the paved highway itself.
Looking at two maps on the county web site is a joke. Both are crisscrossed with seemingly meaningless, unlabeled lines all over the place with no clearly marked “new alignment” much less the old one.
As if to prove the extent to which the public has been duped, a letter to the editor appeared over the weekend from one of those who has been calling on the mayor to change the alignment to get it off the beach.
What with the headline in the paper and the carefully parsed county release it’s understandable that Jimmy Trujillo wrote:
The mayor’s decision to stay off the sand but stay on the roadside is a compromise that warrants support.
It may be one of the few times in the short time I’ve lived on Kaua`i that a government leader has demonstrated any kind of respect to the kupuna leaders and cultural practitioners of the host culture.
The first irony in all this is that a perfectly good bike path exists right now on the makai side of the highway on the pavement- the spot many are erroneously thinking the “new alignment” would put the path.
The problem is that there’s only so much room to put the new four lane highway and for some reason the county has never pursued acquiring land on the mauka “Coco Palms” side of the highway despite the countless permits and extensions issued to the land owners
The second is that the concept of a “removable” boardwalk came about precisely because a permanent concrete sidewalk on the beach would have been an approval nightmare with not just the Army Corp but various state and county agencies who were sold the idea on the basis of a removable boardwalk, not a permanent concrete ribbon.
The county recently passed a bill exempting itself from our “strictest in the nation” shoreline setback laws under some circumstances. Changes in the path should trigger a new “certified shoreline” especially considering that waves commonly deposit sand on the highway during large storms.
Going back to the original unacceptable concrete-on-the-beach idea reminds us of the joke about the guy who eats at Luigi’s Italian restaurant every day and with his meal he is served two slices of Italian bread.
“Luigi” he asks “What’s with the two slices- how come your so stingy with the beard every day”.
The next day Luigi serves him four slices and the man still isn’t happy and wants more. The next day Luigi gives him six and the man still complains.
Finally the next day Luigi takes the whole Italian loaf and slices it down the center the long way and serves it to his customer.
The man looks at Luigi and says “What, Luigi- you’re back to the two slices. eh?”
Can’t anyone here play this game?
Thursday, July 16, 2009
TAKING THE CAKE, PAW PRINTS AND ALL
TAKING THE CAKE, PAW PRINTS AND ALL: Though we mentioned it yesterday we thought we’d delve into the latest massacre of the English language by a Board of Ethics (BOE) member in attempting to make a farce of the county charter provision banning county employees and board and commission members from appearing before other county agencies, boards and commissions on behalf of a private interest.
First there was Mark Hubbard’s delusional contention that his personal interest like getting a driver’s license would be banned using equivocational definitions of “private” and “interest” and separating each to change the meaning of the whole phrase which has a distinct meaning when the words are used together.
But yesterday reporter Mike Levine reported an, if possible, even more bizarre try at parsing the phrase out of existence when BOE member Paul Weil said essentially that if representing “a private interest” was banned that didn’t include non-profit organizations since they acted “in the public interest”.
Here’s what Levine wrote:
Weil said he voted in June to give (BOE Members Judy) Lenthall and (Mark) Hubbard passes on their apparent violations of the charter because they appeared in front of the County Council on behalf of nonprofit organizations that do work in the public interest, not fitting the description of a “private interest.”
Where to start, where to start...
First of all non-profits do not always act in the public’s interest such as trade organizations and many other types. They are in fact private entities as opposed to “the” public entity- the government. The juxtaposition of private sector and public sector aptly describes the difference with non-profits falling on the private side. Non-profits are not subject to governmental laws such as the sunshine law or procurement laws.
But much more important is the abuse of the language in equivocating the word “interest”.
According to the on-line hyperdictionary “interest” has no less than 10 distinct meanings, many totally unrelated to others.
#2 says: interest can mean:
[n] a reason for wanting something done; "for your sake"; "died for the sake of his country"; "in the interest of safety"; "in the common interest"
That is what “in the public interest” means
But #6 says it can mean:
[n] a right or legal share of something; a financial involvement with something; "they have interests all over the world"; "a stake in the company's future"
That is what “a private interest” is.
Weil is an attorney by trade and it shows. He uses one of the oldest shyster lawyer tricks in the book blurring equivocal meanings of a word to confuse and make a bogus point.
The phrase “a private interest”, is a concrete thing, as denoted by the use of the article “a”. As a phrase it means an entity as represented by the phrase, not necessarily the individual words- another trick of wordsmithing sometimes called false deconstruction and reconstruction.
“Acting in the public interest” uses a whole other definition of the word interest denoting a concept to be is acted upon. That’s represented by the prepositional phrase “in the”.
What are they going to come up with next?
In the somewhat distant past (maybe a decade or so) and in semi-related matters the county attorney tried to say that because board and commission members weren’t paid they weren’t “employees” of the county. But that was eventually struck down as the absurdity it was and those trying to foist it on government watchdogs gave up because that would have opened a whole other can of worms- one of which was that then they wouldn’t qualify for the privacy afforded employees.
We covered quite a few others in our three part report “Unethical Culture- Government Service With the Personal ‘Touch’”-
Part 1- Bored of Ethics on the Board of Ethics?Part 2- The Long and Winding Road to InertiaPart 3- Deep Thoughts- A “Handy” Diversion
Like an adolescent who just discovered argumentation based on language but isn’t quite literate enough to pull it off yet, they’ve tried to use it to avoid all sorts of things.
“Take out the trash? I am- we have a date Saturday night.”
“Is your bed made? Yes- and Serta did a very good manufacturing job”
But this latest is a real prize winner so to you, Paul Weil, we present this month’s “What Am I a Freakin’ Idiot?” Award.
Grand prize is your own easy chair at the old boys and girls Crony Club where, if you can negotiate the revolving door, you’ll get an all expenses unpaid stay in the lap of Board and Commission Chief John Isobe. There you can bullshit your way into a future well-paid position with the administration or council of your choice (as if there was ever going to be a choice) stonewalling information requests and spinning incompetence to your hearts delight.
You can pick up your trophy anywhere... just bend over.
First there was Mark Hubbard’s delusional contention that his personal interest like getting a driver’s license would be banned using equivocational definitions of “private” and “interest” and separating each to change the meaning of the whole phrase which has a distinct meaning when the words are used together.
But yesterday reporter Mike Levine reported an, if possible, even more bizarre try at parsing the phrase out of existence when BOE member Paul Weil said essentially that if representing “a private interest” was banned that didn’t include non-profit organizations since they acted “in the public interest”.
Here’s what Levine wrote:
Weil said he voted in June to give (BOE Members Judy) Lenthall and (Mark) Hubbard passes on their apparent violations of the charter because they appeared in front of the County Council on behalf of nonprofit organizations that do work in the public interest, not fitting the description of a “private interest.”
Where to start, where to start...
First of all non-profits do not always act in the public’s interest such as trade organizations and many other types. They are in fact private entities as opposed to “the” public entity- the government. The juxtaposition of private sector and public sector aptly describes the difference with non-profits falling on the private side. Non-profits are not subject to governmental laws such as the sunshine law or procurement laws.
But much more important is the abuse of the language in equivocating the word “interest”.
According to the on-line hyperdictionary “interest” has no less than 10 distinct meanings, many totally unrelated to others.
#2 says: interest can mean:
[n] a reason for wanting something done; "for your sake"; "died for the sake of his country"; "in the interest of safety"; "in the common interest"
That is what “in the public interest” means
But #6 says it can mean:
[n] a right or legal share of something; a financial involvement with something; "they have interests all over the world"; "a stake in the company's future"
That is what “a private interest” is.
Weil is an attorney by trade and it shows. He uses one of the oldest shyster lawyer tricks in the book blurring equivocal meanings of a word to confuse and make a bogus point.
The phrase “a private interest”, is a concrete thing, as denoted by the use of the article “a”. As a phrase it means an entity as represented by the phrase, not necessarily the individual words- another trick of wordsmithing sometimes called false deconstruction and reconstruction.
“Acting in the public interest” uses a whole other definition of the word interest denoting a concept to be is acted upon. That’s represented by the prepositional phrase “in the”.
What are they going to come up with next?
In the somewhat distant past (maybe a decade or so) and in semi-related matters the county attorney tried to say that because board and commission members weren’t paid they weren’t “employees” of the county. But that was eventually struck down as the absurdity it was and those trying to foist it on government watchdogs gave up because that would have opened a whole other can of worms- one of which was that then they wouldn’t qualify for the privacy afforded employees.
We covered quite a few others in our three part report “Unethical Culture- Government Service With the Personal ‘Touch’”-
Part 1- Bored of Ethics on the Board of Ethics?Part 2- The Long and Winding Road to InertiaPart 3- Deep Thoughts- A “Handy” Diversion
Like an adolescent who just discovered argumentation based on language but isn’t quite literate enough to pull it off yet, they’ve tried to use it to avoid all sorts of things.
“Take out the trash? I am- we have a date Saturday night.”
“Is your bed made? Yes- and Serta did a very good manufacturing job”
But this latest is a real prize winner so to you, Paul Weil, we present this month’s “What Am I a Freakin’ Idiot?” Award.
Grand prize is your own easy chair at the old boys and girls Crony Club where, if you can negotiate the revolving door, you’ll get an all expenses unpaid stay in the lap of Board and Commission Chief John Isobe. There you can bullshit your way into a future well-paid position with the administration or council of your choice (as if there was ever going to be a choice) stonewalling information requests and spinning incompetence to your hearts delight.
You can pick up your trophy anywhere... just bend over.
Friday, July 3, 2009
PAGING DR. HEIMLICH
PAGING DR. HEIMLICH: It’s not unusual for besieged pols to pee on your foot and tell you it’s raining while asking us if we’re going to believe them or our own lyin’ eyes..
But for a classic Kaua`i-style “that’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it” take on County Council Chair Kaipo Asing’s and his henchman county clerk Peter Nakamura’s obstinate fight for opaque, closed governance and lack of access to records it took the administration to whip up a gourmet feast of ridiculous, roll-on-the-floor-funny fiction in announcing that they will post the minutes to council meetings on-line at the county’s web site.
Their press release announcing the posting now that dissident Councilmembers Lani Kawahara and Tim Bynum have already done it at their kauaiinfo.org web site, answers our oft asked question “what are we- a bunch of freakin’ idiots” with a resounding “if you believe this, yes”.
The bullsh-t we’re asked to swallow starts at the top where, despite well publicized quotes from administration IT specialist Erik Knutzen that he has been ready for more than a year to post them in an instant and had been prevented by Nakamura and Asing from doing so,
after more than a year of planning the County Council web site will include Council meeting minutes, along with memoranda of actions taken at Council meetings (also called “Recap Memos”)...
Putting meeting minutes and Recap Memos on the Council website is part of a county-wide effort to make more and more public information available online.
The truth is the only year-long effort was to keep them off-line as Bynum and Kawahara have documented and detailed at their kauaiinfo.org web site where they’ve also been posting minutes going back to February as well as other public documents since they posted it in early May.
On to the next mouthful of utter crap.
The implementation of posting Council minutes was delayed by several factors, including the untimely passing of the late Mayor Bryan Baptiste, the complex subsequent transition in county leadership, the special 2008 Mayoral election, the relocation of the Office of the County Clerk - Elections Division, and the seating of a new Council.
As we said Knutzen said, the dynamic duo had been stymied only by Asing’s and Nakamura’s refusal to take two seconds to okay the posting, not by seemingly unrelated minutia.
The fact is that the administration has been posting board and commission meeting minutes routinely for quite some time now and has offered to do so for the council. All these very apparently irrelevant excuses notwithstanding.
One thing that struck us was the availability of what is called “recap memos”- not the fact that they are now going to be available but the fact that such a document exists.
We and others have been asking for years for a way to find out what official actions the council took at meetings as soon as they are over and have always been told there was no such document much less offered one.
It’s always been a supreme hassle to find out what happened at council meetings with the only way to know being to watch the meeting and divine the results from examining future agendas.
No one has ever been offered any such “recap memos” that, we are told, are routinely distributed to the administration.
This press release comes, of course, on the same day as the agenda was released for the July 8 meeting, the first of two alternative dates that a slew of equally if not more important inequities and dictatorial edicts from Chair Asing were supposed to be placed on the agenda for discussion.
It’s not on the July 8 agenda, leaving the showdown scheduled for the July 22 meeting if Asing follows the vote of the council to discuss it on one of the two dates.
One head scratchier is how- and why- Asing and Nakamura had to go to the administration and get poor County Public Information Officer Mary Daubert to do their lying for them.
It indicates that Friend of the Minotaur Mayor Bernard Carvalho is now acting as a cog in Asing’s plantation-era style paternalism in support of the cabal of insiders that run the county through the revolving door personnel polices that have been in effect for decades.
It’s no revelation that they are feeling challenged and threatened by Bynum and Kawahara’s quest for transparency, open governance and democratic principles, especially in light of the current FBI investigation of the county which is still on-going according to recent bureau interviewees.
It is also telling that the “announcement” comes not just from Asing but Vice Chair Jay Furfaro who ran against Asing for the chair last December- with Bynum’s and Kawahara’s support- in a challenge to Asing’s iron-fisted reign.
Furfaro objected to our characterization of the “180” he did between the two meetings earlier this year. During the first, Bynum was blocked from placing resolutions changing the council rules on the agenda and the in next Kawahara changed tactics and managed to get the item placed on a “future” agenda.
Furfaro managed to get his fingerprints on the “day late and dollar short”, minute-posting concession in an self serving and blatant attempt to publicly associate himself with the popular dissidents without actually doing anything about the myriad of other documents that are denied to the public via on-line posting.
Things like the actual communications, resolutions, bills, committee reports and other documentation that accompanies each agenda item- documents which are already available at kauaiinfo.org- remain available only in paper form and require a trip to Lihu`e to obtain.
In addition to Knutzen's document posting program he has said that the administration is also about to start posting and even doing live streaming of the meetings of the planning and police commissions with a feature allowing direct access to “clips” sorted by agenda item.
But despite Knutzen’s offer to do the same for council meetings there’s no announcement here of any plans to allow that to happen when again all that would take is permission from Nakamura and Asing to do so.
It should be pointed out that, for what it’s worth, the county charter says that council and administration are separate organizational entities and, according to the Sunshine Law and UIPA, each are responsible for maintaining their own “records”. But in practice both share the county web site and the contract to facilitate the televising of the various meetings and the “mayor’s show”.
So are we “a bunch of freakin’ idiots”? We sure are if we look at this as some kind of wonderful breakthrough. It’s like ordering and paying for a 12 course meal and getting only a glass of water.
The news here is not that the minutes and recap will be posted- they’re already available on-line no thanks to Asing and Nakamura.
The real news is the council chair’s- not to mention the administration’s- refusal to make all public record available on-line and in a timely manner.
The time to celebrate will only be when all legally-public documents relating to the council, boards, commissions and the administration and it’s departments- itself including all public testimony and correspondence- are available on-line.
Until then the availability of anything less is just another denial of records that apparently violates the Uniform Information Practices Act which, the OIP has recently indicated, mandates widespread distribution of covered documents in electronic form.
The only thing transparent here is the transparently vapid spin claiming that any progress is being made.
----------
Update: In the ES-177 County vs. OIP case we detailed this week, according to reporter Michael Levine of the local newspaper the Hawaii Supreme Court accepted “OIP’s petition for a writ of certiorari on June 23, according to a clerk, and on Wednesday scheduled oral arguments for the morning of Aug. 10.”
But for a classic Kaua`i-style “that’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it” take on County Council Chair Kaipo Asing’s and his henchman county clerk Peter Nakamura’s obstinate fight for opaque, closed governance and lack of access to records it took the administration to whip up a gourmet feast of ridiculous, roll-on-the-floor-funny fiction in announcing that they will post the minutes to council meetings on-line at the county’s web site.
Their press release announcing the posting now that dissident Councilmembers Lani Kawahara and Tim Bynum have already done it at their kauaiinfo.org web site, answers our oft asked question “what are we- a bunch of freakin’ idiots” with a resounding “if you believe this, yes”.
The bullsh-t we’re asked to swallow starts at the top where, despite well publicized quotes from administration IT specialist Erik Knutzen that he has been ready for more than a year to post them in an instant and had been prevented by Nakamura and Asing from doing so,
after more than a year of planning the County Council web site will include Council meeting minutes, along with memoranda of actions taken at Council meetings (also called “Recap Memos”)...
Putting meeting minutes and Recap Memos on the Council website is part of a county-wide effort to make more and more public information available online.
The truth is the only year-long effort was to keep them off-line as Bynum and Kawahara have documented and detailed at their kauaiinfo.org web site where they’ve also been posting minutes going back to February as well as other public documents since they posted it in early May.
On to the next mouthful of utter crap.
The implementation of posting Council minutes was delayed by several factors, including the untimely passing of the late Mayor Bryan Baptiste, the complex subsequent transition in county leadership, the special 2008 Mayoral election, the relocation of the Office of the County Clerk - Elections Division, and the seating of a new Council.
As we said Knutzen said, the dynamic duo had been stymied only by Asing’s and Nakamura’s refusal to take two seconds to okay the posting, not by seemingly unrelated minutia.
The fact is that the administration has been posting board and commission meeting minutes routinely for quite some time now and has offered to do so for the council. All these very apparently irrelevant excuses notwithstanding.
One thing that struck us was the availability of what is called “recap memos”- not the fact that they are now going to be available but the fact that such a document exists.
We and others have been asking for years for a way to find out what official actions the council took at meetings as soon as they are over and have always been told there was no such document much less offered one.
It’s always been a supreme hassle to find out what happened at council meetings with the only way to know being to watch the meeting and divine the results from examining future agendas.
No one has ever been offered any such “recap memos” that, we are told, are routinely distributed to the administration.
This press release comes, of course, on the same day as the agenda was released for the July 8 meeting, the first of two alternative dates that a slew of equally if not more important inequities and dictatorial edicts from Chair Asing were supposed to be placed on the agenda for discussion.
It’s not on the July 8 agenda, leaving the showdown scheduled for the July 22 meeting if Asing follows the vote of the council to discuss it on one of the two dates.
One head scratchier is how- and why- Asing and Nakamura had to go to the administration and get poor County Public Information Officer Mary Daubert to do their lying for them.
It indicates that Friend of the Minotaur Mayor Bernard Carvalho is now acting as a cog in Asing’s plantation-era style paternalism in support of the cabal of insiders that run the county through the revolving door personnel polices that have been in effect for decades.
It’s no revelation that they are feeling challenged and threatened by Bynum and Kawahara’s quest for transparency, open governance and democratic principles, especially in light of the current FBI investigation of the county which is still on-going according to recent bureau interviewees.
It is also telling that the “announcement” comes not just from Asing but Vice Chair Jay Furfaro who ran against Asing for the chair last December- with Bynum’s and Kawahara’s support- in a challenge to Asing’s iron-fisted reign.
Furfaro objected to our characterization of the “180” he did between the two meetings earlier this year. During the first, Bynum was blocked from placing resolutions changing the council rules on the agenda and the in next Kawahara changed tactics and managed to get the item placed on a “future” agenda.
Furfaro managed to get his fingerprints on the “day late and dollar short”, minute-posting concession in an self serving and blatant attempt to publicly associate himself with the popular dissidents without actually doing anything about the myriad of other documents that are denied to the public via on-line posting.
Things like the actual communications, resolutions, bills, committee reports and other documentation that accompanies each agenda item- documents which are already available at kauaiinfo.org- remain available only in paper form and require a trip to Lihu`e to obtain.
In addition to Knutzen's document posting program he has said that the administration is also about to start posting and even doing live streaming of the meetings of the planning and police commissions with a feature allowing direct access to “clips” sorted by agenda item.
But despite Knutzen’s offer to do the same for council meetings there’s no announcement here of any plans to allow that to happen when again all that would take is permission from Nakamura and Asing to do so.
It should be pointed out that, for what it’s worth, the county charter says that council and administration are separate organizational entities and, according to the Sunshine Law and UIPA, each are responsible for maintaining their own “records”. But in practice both share the county web site and the contract to facilitate the televising of the various meetings and the “mayor’s show”.
So are we “a bunch of freakin’ idiots”? We sure are if we look at this as some kind of wonderful breakthrough. It’s like ordering and paying for a 12 course meal and getting only a glass of water.
The news here is not that the minutes and recap will be posted- they’re already available on-line no thanks to Asing and Nakamura.
The real news is the council chair’s- not to mention the administration’s- refusal to make all public record available on-line and in a timely manner.
The time to celebrate will only be when all legally-public documents relating to the council, boards, commissions and the administration and it’s departments- itself including all public testimony and correspondence- are available on-line.
Until then the availability of anything less is just another denial of records that apparently violates the Uniform Information Practices Act which, the OIP has recently indicated, mandates widespread distribution of covered documents in electronic form.
The only thing transparent here is the transparently vapid spin claiming that any progress is being made.
----------
Update: In the ES-177 County vs. OIP case we detailed this week, according to reporter Michael Levine of the local newspaper the Hawaii Supreme Court accepted “OIP’s petition for a writ of certiorari on June 23, according to a clerk, and on Wednesday scheduled oral arguments for the morning of Aug. 10.”
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
AND SO THE POOR DOG HAD NONE
AND SO THE POOR DOG HAD NONE: Our three part series on the Unethical Culture of some members of the Kaua`i Board of Ethics (BOE) detailed the cases of three members of that board who have and continue to violate the plain reading of the county charter’s Code of Ethics which prohibits members of boards and commissions from appearing on behalf of private interests before other boards and commissions, including the county council.
As we concluded. what was missing was that, in order to get the ball rolling to force them to either remove themselves from office or quit representing private interests was an actual complaint filed with the BOE.
So over the weekend, Rolf Bieber felt responsible as a BOE member to take matters into his own hands and file three complaints- two against his fellow BOE members Mark Hubbard and Judy Lenthall and one against attorney Lorna Nishimitsu who sits on the Cost Control Commission.
Bieber, who ran for mayor last fall, told us it wasn’t anything personal and that he respects the three immensely but that the board needed to move forward on the matter because, as it stands there was no enforcement whatsoever of the provision based on BOE decisions in other cases last and earlier this year.
His notarized complaints include the transcripts from the three county council meetings where the three represented private interests- Hubbard for the Kaua`i Action and Planning Alliance, Lenthall for the Kaua`i Food Bank and Nishimitsu for Kikia`ola Land Corporation.
Although none of them would comment for our series, that wasn’t the case when reporter for the local newspaper Michael Levine contacted them for comment on his story today regarding Bieber’s complaints.
And if anyone thought that perhaps Hubbard- the former Chair and now Vice Chair of the BOE- was in need of professional mental health after reading his ramblings in our article his comments to Levine certainly approximate the classic response of a paranoid schizophrenic.
There are apparently at least two Mark Hubbard’s existing nowhere but in Hubbard’s own mind depending on what covers the head that contains the various Hubbard’s.
In classic gibberish Hubbard told Levine:
“The way I read it (Section 20.02(D)) is very simple. When I was sitting there in front of the County Council, the hat I wore was Kaua`i Planning and Action Alliance. I made no representation, I was not considered, not looked upon as vice chair of Ethics. It had nothing to do with Ethics even though I am on that board.
“I didn’t appear as the Ethics person, I appeared as the treasurer of Kaua`i Planning and Action Alliance,” Hubbard said. “The Board of Ethics person wasn’t around. The treasurer of Kaua`i Planning and Action Alliance was around. Yes, it happens to be the same person.”
Hats? What awesome powers do bonnets bestow? They apparently give the wearer the ability to change identity like some kind of incognito emissary in a spy movie attempting to bamboozle his enemies.
Perhaps Hubbard has a secret collection of headwear that allows him to change personas whenever he chooses, much like Superman’s glasses can convince Lois Lane he’s actually mild mannered reporter Clark Kent.
One possible explanation is that it’s the good Mark Hubbard that selflessly appears on behalf of KPPA and his evil twin that sits on the BOE.
But we can only hope Hubbard guards his chapeau collection well lest they fall into the hands of those who do us harm. Imagine the problems it would pose for the courts if the criminal element could avoid prosecution by simply making the right choice at the haberdashers.
Good thing we can trust Hubbard not to abuse his Superhero status...uh he does belong to the Legion of Justice doesn’t he?... or does he simply have a hat for that.
He must have had Tom Terrific’s magic thinking cap to come up with what Levine reported he said next
Asked about the potential for the appearance of a conflict of interest if council members were to one day have to answer to the Board of Ethics, Hubbard said “there’s no such thing.”
“When people talk about the appearance of conflict of interest, to me, that has nothing to do with the Board of Ethics,” he said. “Is there a conflict of interest or isn’t there? There’s no such thing as appearance."
No such thing? Good thing the news hasn’t reached Kaua`i Mark because there 943,000 results for “appearance of a conflict of interest” at Google including the one at Wikipedia which starts off it’s “conflict of interest” entry by saying
A conflict of interest occurs when an individual or organization... has an interest that might compromise their reliability.
A conflict of interest exists even if no improper act results from it, and can create an appearance of impropriety that can undermine confidence in the conflicted individual or organization.
Ask yourself what you would do if appointed for a body that oversees ethics and deals with conflicts of interest. Would you not review what an appearance of conflict of interest actually is before you said it doesn’t exist?
Not our pal Mark- get this final gobbledy-gook
“There is no conflict because I went and asked the council for something. Their choice is to say yes or no. ... I could feel good about that, or bad about that, and I could act. I have some authority, I have a vote on the Board of Ethics. ... (but) I didn’t have a financial interest (in KPAA). That’s the charter and the county regs — it has to be financial.”
No financial interest? KPPA is one of the Kaua`i government’s favorite recipients of their largess, to be distributed to others for various planning projects at PPPA’s pleasure... quite the powerful position.
As a matter of fact, Levine’s article reports, Hubbard’s appearance was quite successful since an extra $14,500 appears in the supplemental budget that came after his “appearance on behalf of” KPPA.
The article also notes that Executive Director Lenthall got $20,000 more in the supplemental budget after her appearance on behalf of the Food Bank.
Lenthall for her part still clings to the inability to distinguish between a personal and private interest telling Levine:
Lenthall said it was unfair to her as an unpaid volunteer that she be expected to give up rights guaranteed to private citizens, citing as an example her right to appeal a property tax assessment, and said the language as currently written could discourage volunteers from helping the county, something she does “out of the goodness of my heart.”
What Lenthall fails to recognize is that it has nothing to do with the “goodness of her heart” and whether she wants to “help the county”. 99.9% of the residents of Kaua`i have and will never come before a board or commission asking for money or tangible considerations. The fact that a small handful of those who do populate these boards and commissions reflect the inherent moral bankruptcy and corrupt mindset of those who feed at the government trough is no coincident born of necessity.
The insinuation that Hubbard is not Hubbard at certain times or that there are multiple Hubbard’s stretches credulity to the breaking point, especially with the quasi-judicial nature of the BOE.
In any other judicial proceeding just the fact that a judge or juror even knows the defendant is cause for them to be excused from the proceedings.
The fact that Hubbard has ruled on the ethics complaints filed against member of the county council in the past makes his claim that he should be permitted to solicit funds from them the construction of an unethical if not criminal mind and one certainly not suited to sit on any county body much less the ethics board.
What are we- a bunch of freakin' idiots? You can certainly check off a big fat “yes” when it comes to what Hubbard and Lenthall think.
As we concluded. what was missing was that, in order to get the ball rolling to force them to either remove themselves from office or quit representing private interests was an actual complaint filed with the BOE.
So over the weekend, Rolf Bieber felt responsible as a BOE member to take matters into his own hands and file three complaints- two against his fellow BOE members Mark Hubbard and Judy Lenthall and one against attorney Lorna Nishimitsu who sits on the Cost Control Commission.
Bieber, who ran for mayor last fall, told us it wasn’t anything personal and that he respects the three immensely but that the board needed to move forward on the matter because, as it stands there was no enforcement whatsoever of the provision based on BOE decisions in other cases last and earlier this year.
His notarized complaints include the transcripts from the three county council meetings where the three represented private interests- Hubbard for the Kaua`i Action and Planning Alliance, Lenthall for the Kaua`i Food Bank and Nishimitsu for Kikia`ola Land Corporation.
Although none of them would comment for our series, that wasn’t the case when reporter for the local newspaper Michael Levine contacted them for comment on his story today regarding Bieber’s complaints.
And if anyone thought that perhaps Hubbard- the former Chair and now Vice Chair of the BOE- was in need of professional mental health after reading his ramblings in our article his comments to Levine certainly approximate the classic response of a paranoid schizophrenic.
There are apparently at least two Mark Hubbard’s existing nowhere but in Hubbard’s own mind depending on what covers the head that contains the various Hubbard’s.
In classic gibberish Hubbard told Levine:
“The way I read it (Section 20.02(D)) is very simple. When I was sitting there in front of the County Council, the hat I wore was Kaua`i Planning and Action Alliance. I made no representation, I was not considered, not looked upon as vice chair of Ethics. It had nothing to do with Ethics even though I am on that board.
“I didn’t appear as the Ethics person, I appeared as the treasurer of Kaua`i Planning and Action Alliance,” Hubbard said. “The Board of Ethics person wasn’t around. The treasurer of Kaua`i Planning and Action Alliance was around. Yes, it happens to be the same person.”
Hats? What awesome powers do bonnets bestow? They apparently give the wearer the ability to change identity like some kind of incognito emissary in a spy movie attempting to bamboozle his enemies.
Perhaps Hubbard has a secret collection of headwear that allows him to change personas whenever he chooses, much like Superman’s glasses can convince Lois Lane he’s actually mild mannered reporter Clark Kent.
One possible explanation is that it’s the good Mark Hubbard that selflessly appears on behalf of KPPA and his evil twin that sits on the BOE.
But we can only hope Hubbard guards his chapeau collection well lest they fall into the hands of those who do us harm. Imagine the problems it would pose for the courts if the criminal element could avoid prosecution by simply making the right choice at the haberdashers.
Good thing we can trust Hubbard not to abuse his Superhero status...uh he does belong to the Legion of Justice doesn’t he?... or does he simply have a hat for that.
He must have had Tom Terrific’s magic thinking cap to come up with what Levine reported he said next
Asked about the potential for the appearance of a conflict of interest if council members were to one day have to answer to the Board of Ethics, Hubbard said “there’s no such thing.”
“When people talk about the appearance of conflict of interest, to me, that has nothing to do with the Board of Ethics,” he said. “Is there a conflict of interest or isn’t there? There’s no such thing as appearance."
No such thing? Good thing the news hasn’t reached Kaua`i Mark because there 943,000 results for “appearance of a conflict of interest” at Google including the one at Wikipedia which starts off it’s “conflict of interest” entry by saying
A conflict of interest occurs when an individual or organization... has an interest that might compromise their reliability.
A conflict of interest exists even if no improper act results from it, and can create an appearance of impropriety that can undermine confidence in the conflicted individual or organization.
Ask yourself what you would do if appointed for a body that oversees ethics and deals with conflicts of interest. Would you not review what an appearance of conflict of interest actually is before you said it doesn’t exist?
Not our pal Mark- get this final gobbledy-gook
“There is no conflict because I went and asked the council for something. Their choice is to say yes or no. ... I could feel good about that, or bad about that, and I could act. I have some authority, I have a vote on the Board of Ethics. ... (but) I didn’t have a financial interest (in KPAA). That’s the charter and the county regs — it has to be financial.”
No financial interest? KPPA is one of the Kaua`i government’s favorite recipients of their largess, to be distributed to others for various planning projects at PPPA’s pleasure... quite the powerful position.
As a matter of fact, Levine’s article reports, Hubbard’s appearance was quite successful since an extra $14,500 appears in the supplemental budget that came after his “appearance on behalf of” KPPA.
The article also notes that Executive Director Lenthall got $20,000 more in the supplemental budget after her appearance on behalf of the Food Bank.
Lenthall for her part still clings to the inability to distinguish between a personal and private interest telling Levine:
Lenthall said it was unfair to her as an unpaid volunteer that she be expected to give up rights guaranteed to private citizens, citing as an example her right to appeal a property tax assessment, and said the language as currently written could discourage volunteers from helping the county, something she does “out of the goodness of my heart.”
What Lenthall fails to recognize is that it has nothing to do with the “goodness of her heart” and whether she wants to “help the county”. 99.9% of the residents of Kaua`i have and will never come before a board or commission asking for money or tangible considerations. The fact that a small handful of those who do populate these boards and commissions reflect the inherent moral bankruptcy and corrupt mindset of those who feed at the government trough is no coincident born of necessity.
The insinuation that Hubbard is not Hubbard at certain times or that there are multiple Hubbard’s stretches credulity to the breaking point, especially with the quasi-judicial nature of the BOE.
In any other judicial proceeding just the fact that a judge or juror even knows the defendant is cause for them to be excused from the proceedings.
The fact that Hubbard has ruled on the ethics complaints filed against member of the county council in the past makes his claim that he should be permitted to solicit funds from them the construction of an unethical if not criminal mind and one certainly not suited to sit on any county body much less the ethics board.
What are we- a bunch of freakin' idiots? You can certainly check off a big fat “yes” when it comes to what Hubbard and Lenthall think.
Monday, April 27, 2009
YANKING ON THE CHOKE-CHAIN
YANKING ON THE CHOKE-CHAIN : Among red diaper babies who came of age in the sixties, when paranoia struck deep into our lives it often crept in the form of a book which had not yet come of age- George Orwell’s 1984.
Written in 1948, at it’s then futuristic heart was a depiction of the now common practice of using less ominous euphemisms to replace hot button words with cooler though less accurate language.
Sure enough the practice was perfected during the Regan years and has become a de rigor cog of the modern political spin machine.
At first the press was skeptical but as real journalism devolved into a quick juxtaposition of unexamined opposing quotes of the “he said she said” ilk, truth became a casualty and “they say it- we print it” became the standard M..O. for every corporate reporter and editor.
What used to be episodes of acknowledged Orwellian doublethink- and the resultant popular term doublespeak, which is actually not part of the book- are now part of a widely accepted Orwellianism that doesn’t even elicit a second thought from the Joe News-consumer.
So it’s not really surprising that every- and we mean every- news report about the Bush administration’s torturing of prisoners refers to “enhanced interrogation techniques” sometimes adding “that some refer to as torture”
No! (and we don’t use exclamation marks lightly). What are we, freakin’ idiots? It’s torture- it never was and never will be anything else. The only ones who call it “enhanced interrogation” are the ones who tortured people.
The fact that some wigged-out wise-asses tried to write their way out of it at the behest of the administration overlords doesn’t make it anything but torture under an assumed name.
But the mainstream corporate press is so entombed in the cacophony of their own echo chamber that they can actually no longer press the BS button and report the “truth”, allowing special interests to dictate the very language that the last generation so profoundly feared would supplant the apparent.
Perhaps due to 21st Century corporate-style reporting, apparently the current “current occupant”- to use humorist Garrison Keilor’s catch-phrase for the last White House denizen- is perfectly happy being every bit as lawless as his predecessor, using George Bush’s creative constitutionalism to think himself enough of a “unitary executive” to say who is and isn’t above the law.
It is illegal to the US to torture prisoners, not just under international law but under the 1988 U.N. Convention Against Torture that Ronald Regan signed, making the law of the land.
What’s even worse than the misuse of language may be the notion that somehow “it worked” so it’s all an “ends justifies the means” wash.
Where to start with this little bit of disingenuous drivel, where to start?
We could start with the fact that the ends rarely justify the means.
Or we might ask who defines “works”... Dick Chaney? His citation of the fact that there hasn’t been another 9/11-style incident to show it “worked” is like the old joke about the guy wearing a tin-foil hat, dancing on one foot on the center stripe of the freeway, saying he’s keeping away the elephants and citing the lacking proximal presence of pachyderms as proof of his success.
Only a war-criminal could ignore decades of research showing that torture does not work.
The latest in a long line of interrogators who have almost unanimously reached this conclusion is U.S. Major Matthew Alexander -a named assumed for security reasons- who personally interrogated 300 Iraqi prisoners.
According to the UK newspaper The Independent, in his book with John R Bruning called “How to Break a Terrorist: The US interrogators who used brains, not brutality, to take down the deadliest man in Iraq”, he details what everyone from the FBI to the CIA to every cop-on-the-beat knows- that developing a relationship with a subject is what elicits information.
Torture elicits, at best no information and at worst incorrect information and “confessions” from those who will say whatever the torturer wants to hear, many times “information” designed to mislead and sometimes to injure those in whose name the torture is performed.
The squishy moral center of American political leadership isn’t something new- for all the deification of the founding fathers their genocide of 30 million native Americans and enslavement of an equal number of Africans sometimes makes the Nazis look like incompetent amateurs.
According to Wikipedia the Nuremberg Principles were a set of guidelines for determining what constitutes a war crime, set down during the Nuremberg trials of Nazis after WWII and signed by the U.S.
Principle IV says:
The fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his Government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility under international law, provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him.
That’s principle came as a result of the famous Nuremberg Defense used by those who, like the CIA personnel and others in Iraq and Guantanamo, were “ordered” to torutre or kill but said they were not responsible because they were “just following orders.”
As important for President Barack Obama, who has apparently “decided”- or at least “instructed” the Attorney General- not to prosecute the actual torturers, is Principle VII which says:
Complicity in the commission of a crime against peace, a war crime, or a crime against humanity as set forth in Principle VI is a crime under international law.
Complicity under U.S, law includes obstructing justice especially to hinder prosecution which would make Obama an accessory to war crimes if he bans prosecution of those covered under Principle IV.
It should also be noted that war crimes include not just actual torture but any “ill-treatment of prisoners of war”
Torture itself is banned under Article 4 of the 1949 Third Geneva Convention and defined in part as
any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a male or female person for such purposes as obtaining from him, or a third person, information...
Some, even among those who show the intelectual curioisty and consistancy to go beyond the usual left-right, Democratic-Republican and American-forigner axese, may accepet the “truths” herein described and yet still feel compelled to case-specifically shun the rule of law.
They may see the war crimes of Bush, Chaney, Rice, Gonzalez and others so heinous as to shake the county to it’s core and undermine the foundation should they be proescuted and many rather call for a “truth and recociliation commission” type resolution.
But the rule of law, if not to insure punishment or make re-offending impossible, is to insure, as people said after “the” holocaust, it happens “never again”.
If they count on the people of the country to “never again” elect someone with a predilection for such criminal intent they’d best remember how unlikely many American voters thought such a scenario in November of 2000.
1984 came, just as predicted- both the year and the world ascribed to it in the book. But while we calmly munch our pita-bread and watch reporters on the wall mounted screen discuss the circus of a recent NY Times editorial discussion regarding whether the “enhanced interrogations” were merely “harsh” or should now be described as “brutal”, we’d best remember that 2540 is yet to come and even now it’s beginning to look like a “Brave New World”.
Written in 1948, at it’s then futuristic heart was a depiction of the now common practice of using less ominous euphemisms to replace hot button words with cooler though less accurate language.
Sure enough the practice was perfected during the Regan years and has become a de rigor cog of the modern political spin machine.
At first the press was skeptical but as real journalism devolved into a quick juxtaposition of unexamined opposing quotes of the “he said she said” ilk, truth became a casualty and “they say it- we print it” became the standard M..O. for every corporate reporter and editor.
What used to be episodes of acknowledged Orwellian doublethink- and the resultant popular term doublespeak, which is actually not part of the book- are now part of a widely accepted Orwellianism that doesn’t even elicit a second thought from the Joe News-consumer.
So it’s not really surprising that every- and we mean every- news report about the Bush administration’s torturing of prisoners refers to “enhanced interrogation techniques” sometimes adding “that some refer to as torture”
No! (and we don’t use exclamation marks lightly). What are we, freakin’ idiots? It’s torture- it never was and never will be anything else. The only ones who call it “enhanced interrogation” are the ones who tortured people.
The fact that some wigged-out wise-asses tried to write their way out of it at the behest of the administration overlords doesn’t make it anything but torture under an assumed name.
But the mainstream corporate press is so entombed in the cacophony of their own echo chamber that they can actually no longer press the BS button and report the “truth”, allowing special interests to dictate the very language that the last generation so profoundly feared would supplant the apparent.
Perhaps due to 21st Century corporate-style reporting, apparently the current “current occupant”- to use humorist Garrison Keilor’s catch-phrase for the last White House denizen- is perfectly happy being every bit as lawless as his predecessor, using George Bush’s creative constitutionalism to think himself enough of a “unitary executive” to say who is and isn’t above the law.
It is illegal to the US to torture prisoners, not just under international law but under the 1988 U.N. Convention Against Torture that Ronald Regan signed, making the law of the land.
What’s even worse than the misuse of language may be the notion that somehow “it worked” so it’s all an “ends justifies the means” wash.
Where to start with this little bit of disingenuous drivel, where to start?
We could start with the fact that the ends rarely justify the means.
Or we might ask who defines “works”... Dick Chaney? His citation of the fact that there hasn’t been another 9/11-style incident to show it “worked” is like the old joke about the guy wearing a tin-foil hat, dancing on one foot on the center stripe of the freeway, saying he’s keeping away the elephants and citing the lacking proximal presence of pachyderms as proof of his success.
Only a war-criminal could ignore decades of research showing that torture does not work.
The latest in a long line of interrogators who have almost unanimously reached this conclusion is U.S. Major Matthew Alexander -a named assumed for security reasons- who personally interrogated 300 Iraqi prisoners.
According to the UK newspaper The Independent, in his book with John R Bruning called “How to Break a Terrorist: The US interrogators who used brains, not brutality, to take down the deadliest man in Iraq”, he details what everyone from the FBI to the CIA to every cop-on-the-beat knows- that developing a relationship with a subject is what elicits information.
Torture elicits, at best no information and at worst incorrect information and “confessions” from those who will say whatever the torturer wants to hear, many times “information” designed to mislead and sometimes to injure those in whose name the torture is performed.
The squishy moral center of American political leadership isn’t something new- for all the deification of the founding fathers their genocide of 30 million native Americans and enslavement of an equal number of Africans sometimes makes the Nazis look like incompetent amateurs.
According to Wikipedia the Nuremberg Principles were a set of guidelines for determining what constitutes a war crime, set down during the Nuremberg trials of Nazis after WWII and signed by the U.S.
Principle IV says:
The fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his Government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility under international law, provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him.
That’s principle came as a result of the famous Nuremberg Defense used by those who, like the CIA personnel and others in Iraq and Guantanamo, were “ordered” to torutre or kill but said they were not responsible because they were “just following orders.”
As important for President Barack Obama, who has apparently “decided”- or at least “instructed” the Attorney General- not to prosecute the actual torturers, is Principle VII which says:
Complicity in the commission of a crime against peace, a war crime, or a crime against humanity as set forth in Principle VI is a crime under international law.
Complicity under U.S, law includes obstructing justice especially to hinder prosecution which would make Obama an accessory to war crimes if he bans prosecution of those covered under Principle IV.
It should also be noted that war crimes include not just actual torture but any “ill-treatment of prisoners of war”
Torture itself is banned under Article 4 of the 1949 Third Geneva Convention and defined in part as
any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a male or female person for such purposes as obtaining from him, or a third person, information...
Some, even among those who show the intelectual curioisty and consistancy to go beyond the usual left-right, Democratic-Republican and American-forigner axese, may accepet the “truths” herein described and yet still feel compelled to case-specifically shun the rule of law.
They may see the war crimes of Bush, Chaney, Rice, Gonzalez and others so heinous as to shake the county to it’s core and undermine the foundation should they be proescuted and many rather call for a “truth and recociliation commission” type resolution.
But the rule of law, if not to insure punishment or make re-offending impossible, is to insure, as people said after “the” holocaust, it happens “never again”.
If they count on the people of the country to “never again” elect someone with a predilection for such criminal intent they’d best remember how unlikely many American voters thought such a scenario in November of 2000.
1984 came, just as predicted- both the year and the world ascribed to it in the book. But while we calmly munch our pita-bread and watch reporters on the wall mounted screen discuss the circus of a recent NY Times editorial discussion regarding whether the “enhanced interrogations” were merely “harsh” or should now be described as “brutal”, we’d best remember that 2540 is yet to come and even now it’s beginning to look like a “Brave New World”.
Friday, April 24, 2009
DAMN THE DALMATIAN; MUFFY NEEDS A MAKEOVER
DAMN THE DALMATIAN; MUFFY NEEDS A MAKEOVER: The word irony apparently isn’t in the county council’s lexicon although we’re not sure if that’s because County Clerk Peter Nakamura simply refuses to release the dictionary to councilmembers or because the pontiff of Kaua`i, Chair Kaipo Asing, believes in his own self-proclaimed infallibility.
Wednesday’s council meeting presented a plethora of inexplicable and baffling contradictory discussions. When juxtaposed they make it all too obvious why the council makes it almost impossible to access the minutes to their meetings- if people read their words in print rather than seeing snippets in catch-as-catch can cablecasts they might just hold them accountable for what they say and do.
Early on the council chambers was packed with pastel aloha shirts and mu`umu`us with name tags along with a few suits, as a virtual who’s who of tourism and business community hacks filed before the council to sing the praises of the first half of a million dollar flush down the toilet of the Kauai Visitors’ Bureau, which we tore into last month.
The smiling faces and self congratulatory excesses turned stomachs for about an hour as the recipients paraded up to thank the council for tossing taxpayer money into the rat-hole of their bottom lines, one even carefully using the words “domino down” to describe how it will trickle all-over the low paid, expendable workers in the hotel plantations.
Others voiced the unverifiable assurances that there was a “plan” with “measurable” results despite the fact that there is, as yet, no such plan in the hands of the public.
But never fear- the plan had been verbally “shared” in an apparently mesmerizing two hour session where KVB honcho Sue Kanoho, County Economic Development Director George Costa and Hypnotist-In-Chief/Councilmember Dickie Chang (how else would you explain a minimally-talented, sycophantic tourism-shill being our top TV personality) bedazzled nit-picker and council watchdogs Glenn Mickens and Ken Taylor with where and how the money would be spent.
As we said in March, everyone wants to come here- advertising does no good. While we win out all the time on location, location, location the only thing stopping people from coming here is price, price, price.
But rather than use the money, as we and Mickens suggested in March, to directly subsidize tourists’ trips- assuming it is ever a good idea to spend taxpayer dollars on corporate welfare like this- we’re actually using it to pay off travel agents and “wholesalers” to “talk us up”- which presumes other locations aren’t paying them more and that simply advertising big resorts on Kaua`i provides us with additional visitors at all.
When Councilwoman Lani Kawahara suggested that perhaps at least some of the responsibility for promotion should lie with those who stood to benefit she was basically told not to worry her pretty little head about it and literally laughed at by councilmembers and the crowd.
But otherwise, never was heard a discouraging word and the looming budget deficit did not elicit a discouraging word all day as the bankers and hotel executives spread their deer and antelope manure throughout the council chambers.
And why wouldn’t they- if the plan benefits anyone- which is certainly not a given or even knowable in the long run- it certainly isn’t directly going to benefit any small businesses, just the Sheratons and Hyatts and Prineville Hotels who are the promotional targets and set to receive all of any largess the grant “stimulates”.
The bill now heads from the public hearing to the council’s Finance Committee for preliminary decision making and then a predictably swift passage.
But if there’s plenty of cash in the coffers to waste in this million dollar handout to these assorted thieves an afternoon of gloomy projections were yet to come.
Apparently sometime between mid morning and mid afternoon the council “found out” there might be a budget shortfall.
So it seems like it was just bad timing when the agenda turned to getting the administrative personnel of the Kaua`i Fire Department (KFD) out of the shoe box they currently occupy.
The council was being asked to a measly $40,000 cover the rest of the budget year and get them moved into new, although supposedly temporary, digs right now with about $100,000 in yearly lease payments to come.
Yet this request got more scrutiny than State Senator Donna Kim gave the DBEDT this year.
The reason for this- conveniently blamed on “the administration” although the council has been more than complicit- is the total inaction on making the empty space in the Pi`ikoi building available for KFD offices- for which architectural design plans were completed years ago but was never built when the first renovation was done
The council has been throwing money at three administrations- including that of Chair Asing who was mayor for a few months last summer- to get it done but of course as usual without holding them accountable and just giving them all the money they requested for quarter-million-dollars-a-pop consultants... and doing so for the third time just last April with no results.
Poor chief Bob Westerman- perhaps the most competent and honest person in the employ of the county- begging for a an office where they don’t have to work at “mini-desks” to administer arguably the most important service the county provides.
After a fog filled discussion with Public Works Deputy Ed Renaud and Administrative Assistant Gary Heu where they hemmed and hawed their way through an explanation of what the f—k is taking so long to get the space-planner they hired in April to so some planning Asing took center stage for the big disconnect.
Asing asked no one in particular why this delay wasn’t brought to his attention when he was mayor- conveniently ignoring the fact that he, if anybody, should have been most aware of the 20-year delay in getting the various county agencies into the buildings the county purchased for that purpose in the 1980’s since he’s been on the council ever since then except for a two year stint in the 90’s.
Then, as if to highlight all he knew but somehow forgot while he was in the round building, it was time for one of Asing’s famous “presentations”- ones he never seems to be at a lack for especially now that he controls all of the council’s staff research time and an issue which other council members have complained about in public session,
Anyway he started off with a long discussion that flew in the face of his usual admonitions of not just the public but councilmembers to only address times within the strict confines of the matter as described on the agenda- a tactic supposedly to comply with the sunshine law” but usually used by Asing to stop “uncomfortable” discussion when on occasion someone tries to honestly discuss the topic and to connect it to the real impediments or corruption.
Asing launched into his version of the “financial crisis” with long rehashing of national and even international monetary policy passing through the state’s crunch and eventually getting to the point- the possibility the state won’t give us our share of the transient accommodation tax to the tune of a projected $11 million this year.
Conclusion? We might not be able to afford to give the KFD the space it so desperately needs and has so patiently awaited with Westerman’s usual “we will continue to meet our obligations to provide public safety” no matter how shabbily they are treated by the council and administration.
So let’s get this straight Kaipo- there’s plenty of money to throw a million down the tubes of visitor industry’s bottom line needs but, because we won’t get our fair share of the money that is collected from that same industry, we can’t afford $40,000 to get the fire department out of an impossibly cramped room, smaller than the council chambers and containing more people than showed up that day, according to Kawahara.
It’s no wonder getting things like pertinent documents and meeting minutes from the council is nearly impossible and the idea of putting them on-line is anathema to Asing and Nakamura who rule with an iron fist.
Even the cable casts of the meetings are “descheduled” with a catch as catch can, rarely announced scheduling that never puts them on at the same time twice and simply presents them on a revolving basis presenting the most current council, planning and police commission and mayor’s PR programs.
Ho`ike TV is nothing if not accommodating of the power elite on Kaua`i.
We can’t even come up with clever concluding sentences anymore- trite clichés will suffice... as usual... same as it ever was... new week, same s--t.
Wednesday’s council meeting presented a plethora of inexplicable and baffling contradictory discussions. When juxtaposed they make it all too obvious why the council makes it almost impossible to access the minutes to their meetings- if people read their words in print rather than seeing snippets in catch-as-catch can cablecasts they might just hold them accountable for what they say and do.
Early on the council chambers was packed with pastel aloha shirts and mu`umu`us with name tags along with a few suits, as a virtual who’s who of tourism and business community hacks filed before the council to sing the praises of the first half of a million dollar flush down the toilet of the Kauai Visitors’ Bureau, which we tore into last month.
The smiling faces and self congratulatory excesses turned stomachs for about an hour as the recipients paraded up to thank the council for tossing taxpayer money into the rat-hole of their bottom lines, one even carefully using the words “domino down” to describe how it will trickle all-over the low paid, expendable workers in the hotel plantations.
Others voiced the unverifiable assurances that there was a “plan” with “measurable” results despite the fact that there is, as yet, no such plan in the hands of the public.
But never fear- the plan had been verbally “shared” in an apparently mesmerizing two hour session where KVB honcho Sue Kanoho, County Economic Development Director George Costa and Hypnotist-In-Chief/Councilmember Dickie Chang (how else would you explain a minimally-talented, sycophantic tourism-shill being our top TV personality) bedazzled nit-picker and council watchdogs Glenn Mickens and Ken Taylor with where and how the money would be spent.
As we said in March, everyone wants to come here- advertising does no good. While we win out all the time on location, location, location the only thing stopping people from coming here is price, price, price.
But rather than use the money, as we and Mickens suggested in March, to directly subsidize tourists’ trips- assuming it is ever a good idea to spend taxpayer dollars on corporate welfare like this- we’re actually using it to pay off travel agents and “wholesalers” to “talk us up”- which presumes other locations aren’t paying them more and that simply advertising big resorts on Kaua`i provides us with additional visitors at all.
When Councilwoman Lani Kawahara suggested that perhaps at least some of the responsibility for promotion should lie with those who stood to benefit she was basically told not to worry her pretty little head about it and literally laughed at by councilmembers and the crowd.
But otherwise, never was heard a discouraging word and the looming budget deficit did not elicit a discouraging word all day as the bankers and hotel executives spread their deer and antelope manure throughout the council chambers.
And why wouldn’t they- if the plan benefits anyone- which is certainly not a given or even knowable in the long run- it certainly isn’t directly going to benefit any small businesses, just the Sheratons and Hyatts and Prineville Hotels who are the promotional targets and set to receive all of any largess the grant “stimulates”.
The bill now heads from the public hearing to the council’s Finance Committee for preliminary decision making and then a predictably swift passage.
But if there’s plenty of cash in the coffers to waste in this million dollar handout to these assorted thieves an afternoon of gloomy projections were yet to come.
Apparently sometime between mid morning and mid afternoon the council “found out” there might be a budget shortfall.
So it seems like it was just bad timing when the agenda turned to getting the administrative personnel of the Kaua`i Fire Department (KFD) out of the shoe box they currently occupy.
The council was being asked to a measly $40,000 cover the rest of the budget year and get them moved into new, although supposedly temporary, digs right now with about $100,000 in yearly lease payments to come.
Yet this request got more scrutiny than State Senator Donna Kim gave the DBEDT this year.
The reason for this- conveniently blamed on “the administration” although the council has been more than complicit- is the total inaction on making the empty space in the Pi`ikoi building available for KFD offices- for which architectural design plans were completed years ago but was never built when the first renovation was done
The council has been throwing money at three administrations- including that of Chair Asing who was mayor for a few months last summer- to get it done but of course as usual without holding them accountable and just giving them all the money they requested for quarter-million-dollars-a-pop consultants... and doing so for the third time just last April with no results.
Poor chief Bob Westerman- perhaps the most competent and honest person in the employ of the county- begging for a an office where they don’t have to work at “mini-desks” to administer arguably the most important service the county provides.
After a fog filled discussion with Public Works Deputy Ed Renaud and Administrative Assistant Gary Heu where they hemmed and hawed their way through an explanation of what the f—k is taking so long to get the space-planner they hired in April to so some planning Asing took center stage for the big disconnect.
Asing asked no one in particular why this delay wasn’t brought to his attention when he was mayor- conveniently ignoring the fact that he, if anybody, should have been most aware of the 20-year delay in getting the various county agencies into the buildings the county purchased for that purpose in the 1980’s since he’s been on the council ever since then except for a two year stint in the 90’s.
Then, as if to highlight all he knew but somehow forgot while he was in the round building, it was time for one of Asing’s famous “presentations”- ones he never seems to be at a lack for especially now that he controls all of the council’s staff research time and an issue which other council members have complained about in public session,
Anyway he started off with a long discussion that flew in the face of his usual admonitions of not just the public but councilmembers to only address times within the strict confines of the matter as described on the agenda- a tactic supposedly to comply with the sunshine law” but usually used by Asing to stop “uncomfortable” discussion when on occasion someone tries to honestly discuss the topic and to connect it to the real impediments or corruption.
Asing launched into his version of the “financial crisis” with long rehashing of national and even international monetary policy passing through the state’s crunch and eventually getting to the point- the possibility the state won’t give us our share of the transient accommodation tax to the tune of a projected $11 million this year.
Conclusion? We might not be able to afford to give the KFD the space it so desperately needs and has so patiently awaited with Westerman’s usual “we will continue to meet our obligations to provide public safety” no matter how shabbily they are treated by the council and administration.
So let’s get this straight Kaipo- there’s plenty of money to throw a million down the tubes of visitor industry’s bottom line needs but, because we won’t get our fair share of the money that is collected from that same industry, we can’t afford $40,000 to get the fire department out of an impossibly cramped room, smaller than the council chambers and containing more people than showed up that day, according to Kawahara.
It’s no wonder getting things like pertinent documents and meeting minutes from the council is nearly impossible and the idea of putting them on-line is anathema to Asing and Nakamura who rule with an iron fist.
Even the cable casts of the meetings are “descheduled” with a catch as catch can, rarely announced scheduling that never puts them on at the same time twice and simply presents them on a revolving basis presenting the most current council, planning and police commission and mayor’s PR programs.
Ho`ike TV is nothing if not accommodating of the power elite on Kaua`i.
We can’t even come up with clever concluding sentences anymore- trite clichés will suffice... as usual... same as it ever was... new week, same s--t.
Monday, March 30, 2009
DERAILING THE GRAVY TRAINING:
DERAILING THE GRAVY TRAINING: Back sometime in the early 80’s when Ronnie Ray-Gun was busy chest-thumping at the Ruskies like Bonzo there was a particularly tense period when the frenzy was so whipped-up many of America’s rabble though attack was imminent.
It was during this period of profound fear-mongering that the skies of Kaua`i were suddenly and disturbingly full of presumably military fighter jets one day, annoyingly buzzing residential neighborhoods for hours on end.
The noise and indeed the earth-shaking became too much and we called the FAA to complain.
After a tirade basically asking “what the f--- is going on” we were put on hold for about five minutes before being told- and we kid you not- “don’t worry... they’re ours.”
“We don’t care who the hell’s they are” we screamed “stop it- now.”
We tell this story because even this clueless bit of federal paternalism had nothing on our very own local brand, as exhibited by Kaua`i Councilmembers Jay Furfaro and Dickie Chang at last Wednesday’s (3/25) meeting when discussion turned to a bill to appropriate a half a million dollars to shove down the rat hole of tourism promotion.
It’s bad enough that the county is once again throwing money at an industry that provides at best crappy jobs cleaning toilets with our tongues for substandard wages while it scoops up most of the wads of incoming cash for outgoing designation. It’s bad enough that there’s never any credible evidence that more advertising does anything to increase tourist numbers... assuming that’s a good thing in the first place. And it’s bad enough that the administration wants to do this while they are putting essential county services on the back burner by refusing to allow departments to fill vital open positions.
But when the bill came up for first reading before the council there was not only no specific information for the public- even after we requested it preceding the meeting- the reading was followed by a perfunctory “don’t worry your pretty little head- we’ve seen a plan... and it’s ok” from Furfaro and Chang.
But the public wasn’t even going to get that much until council watchdog Glenn Mickens got up and asked, as we asked the FAA, “what the f--- is going on“ eliciting the “don’t worry they’re ours” from the two tourism-industry, council-embedded shills.
Presumably if no one said anything the bill would, as we see all the time with “money bills”, go to a pubic hearing, one committee meeting and a final second reading, all without a peep out of anyone on the council or administration on anything but a barest of bones plan for spending... if that.
There is supposedly a plan- something about somehow bribing the “wholesalers” of vacation packages according to Furfaro and Chang who sought to hush Mickens up after his testimony by telling him they’d seen the plan and it was okay with them so shut up sit down and let us worry about it.
Mickens testimony described a few choice past rat holes for tourism promotion money which the industry has conned out of the county without any accountability or measurable “bang for the buck”.
Mickens asked a simple question that people have been asking for years- if we’re going to spend all this money why not do the one thing that will insure we get warm bodies on the ground... distribute vouchers for the tourists themselves for airfare, presumably on any flight into Kaua`i.
But we might never have even heard anything about the idiotic and thread-bare drivel-heavy plan had it not been for an article by a relatively new yet excellent reporter at the local paper, Michael Levine- asking some questions and apparently getting a hold of a “report” of sorts from new county Director of Economic Development George Costa after the meeting.
Levine describes the “plan” which is heavy on vague categorical generalities with a dearth of actual details of distribution of the money or any feedback or accountability mechanism.
Though it’s not apparent whether Levine actually saw a plan or just got a description of it, it appears to be another of these advertising based boondoggles throwing money at a bunch of pre-selected targeted “wholesalers” that will supposedly promote other unlisted pre-selected businesses, presumably corporate off-island owned hotels and tour businesses
Levine writes:
“The main emphasis of the program is working with wholesalers to drive new bookings to Kaua`i over a wide variety of properties and to encourage spending in local businesses through a coupon book that will be created in partnership with the Kaua`i Chamber of Commerce,” he said. “Based on Hawai`i Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism visitor spending statistics, the $500,000 being requested for the marketing program is estimated to generate approximately $15 to 17 million in our island economy.”
Oh, is that the same DBED&T that is slated by some legislators for demolition and is famous for erroneous statistics and throwing STATE money down their rat hole?
The proposal shows that the $500,000 described as “Phase I” would include $250,000 to be split evenly among five wholesale partners or online travel agencies, and the coupon book described by Costa will likely be a part of that plan.
Oh boy- coupon books- a bunch of worthless “buy one get one free” and “free gift with purchase” coupons that are 99% useless crap, as most tourists know.
The proposal listed the top five such partners for Kaua`i as Pleasant Holidays, Expedia, Travelocity, Orbitz and Blue Sky Tours.
And what exactly are we going to do- bribe them to get them to trick people into coming to Kaua`i?.. When you click-on Florida you get Kaua`i? What happens if Honolulu pays them $251,000 to send them to Waikiki?
“Sixty-five percent of our room nights on Kaua`i come from 12 major wholesalers,” said Council Vice Chair Jay Furfaro in response to Mickens’ testimony.
This isn’t being directed at trade shows, he said, it’s being directed at “key customers we refer to as wholesalers.”
Furfaro recently cut all his job-related ties to the tourism industry where he spent his whole life working as an executive, after being continually caught in conflicts of interest, and now that such ties require recusal.
Also included in the proposal was $170,000 for a kama`aina campaign encouraging locals on other Hawaiian Islands to visit Kaua`i, with a special focus on military personnel. The 50th anniversary celebration for South Pacific, scheduled for September, would receive $30,000, and $25,000 apiece would go to a radio show and to Kaua`i Visitors Bureau administration fees.
Oh boy- more advertising... and event support. That’ll work... and if it doesn’t how will we know? As usual the answer to that is unquantifiable... so shut up Parx.
Phase II, which would cost another $500,000 and could be funded through the upcoming budget process, would allocate another $250,000 to five wholesale partners, $170,000 to the kama`aina campaign, $40,000 to a “Northwest Blitz” and $25,000 apiece to a radio show and to Kaua`i Visitors Bureau administration fees.
Yes folks this only fills up half of the rat hole.
Only either a complete idiot or the recipients of kickbacks could possibly think that increasing advertising will get more people to come to Hawai`i or specifically Kaua`i these days.
Presumably these dunderheads have been to the mainland and talked to people there. Have they ever found one person who never heard of Hawai`i much less one who has to be convinced to come here, all else being equal?
Of course not. People on the mainland don’t need to be reminded how much they want to come here, possibly over every other single visitor destination around the world. It’s at the top of the list for everyone’s “dream vacation”.
So what’s stopping them?.. the fact that they didn’t see a 30 second clip of bikini clad beach-goers or fake hula dancers?
What are we- a bunch a freakin idiots? It’s the cost you shemageggis. “Everyone knows” the airfare is outrageous, the hotel rooms and rent-a-cars are out of sight and on and on.
Whether this is actually true doesn’t matter because people belive it is and no amount of advertising saying “no really- it’s not that expensive” will cause them to experience a pissy-foot as rain.
The only thing that will get them here is actual good-as-cash vouchers, as Glenn suggested. And not those lousy restricted ones that can only go to one or two specific business... which have already raised their prices by $200 in anticipation of participating in that kind of scam... a scam most mainlanders have seen and won’t get taken in with again.
$1 million would translate to 5000 $200 vouchers to be used unrestricted on any airline as Glenn suggested.
Actually we’d suggest they be used for any business on Kaua`i too and perhaps use them to leverage a “double your Kaua`i Voucher” program for participating airlines or businesses to get a bigger bang for the buck.
The boneheads in tourism promotion are quite obviously either clueless.. or corrupt.
With no accountability with strictly advertising-based promotions. That assures that there is no feedback mechanism to establish it’s effectiveness in solid verifiable numbers. So they can never be held accountable and hold their jobs forever whether they perform or not.
Just look at this hilarious paragraph from an article in the local paper this weekend from Sue Kanoho executive director of the Kaua`i Visitors Bureau:
The second assumption I often hear is that they think all KVB does is “just place print advertising” to get the word out about Kaua`i. In fact, KVB has a myriad of areas that we focus on to market the island. In addition to print advertising, KVB also does television spots and television programs, radio ads, outdoor advertising, e-marketing, webinars, travel trade advertising, trade shows, product launches, destination training, wholesaler cooperatives, event marketing, familiarization tours, research and last, but not least, and one of the most important elements…. public relations.
Uh, Sue, maybe the problem is that all you can think of to do is advertise, no matter what the medium.
It’s evocative of a line from the movie The Blues Brothers where the patrons of the chicken-wire bar where they’re about to play tell them “We like both kinds of music- country AND western”.
The reason for this mindset is perhaps that they belive the only way to get people here is to con them into doing it, implying that otherwise they would never come.
That may be true of other locales but these marketing geniuses, many of whom come from other places where they cut their visitors destination marketing teeth, have no understanding of the built in desirability of the local product- Hawai`i itself- whether in reality or through the fantasy that mainland denizens hold in their mind of the islands as the ultimate destination.
If you ask them the only obstacle in their minds is cost. So why not give them something real that will also assure the behavior we seek along with a built in unambiguous accounting of where the money went and exactly what we got for it?
Actually we shouldn’t be spending a nickel on promoting someone else’s business- it’s amazing how quickly entrepreneurial free-market zealots turn into promoters of a welfare state when the handout is for them.
But if these gullible politicians feel they have to spend money on tourism promotion it’s time to stop the corrupt kick-back-ready system of advertising a product that couldn’t be any more desirable... unless it were free.
It was during this period of profound fear-mongering that the skies of Kaua`i were suddenly and disturbingly full of presumably military fighter jets one day, annoyingly buzzing residential neighborhoods for hours on end.
The noise and indeed the earth-shaking became too much and we called the FAA to complain.
After a tirade basically asking “what the f--- is going on” we were put on hold for about five minutes before being told- and we kid you not- “don’t worry... they’re ours.”
“We don’t care who the hell’s they are” we screamed “stop it- now.”
We tell this story because even this clueless bit of federal paternalism had nothing on our very own local brand, as exhibited by Kaua`i Councilmembers Jay Furfaro and Dickie Chang at last Wednesday’s (3/25) meeting when discussion turned to a bill to appropriate a half a million dollars to shove down the rat hole of tourism promotion.
It’s bad enough that the county is once again throwing money at an industry that provides at best crappy jobs cleaning toilets with our tongues for substandard wages while it scoops up most of the wads of incoming cash for outgoing designation. It’s bad enough that there’s never any credible evidence that more advertising does anything to increase tourist numbers... assuming that’s a good thing in the first place. And it’s bad enough that the administration wants to do this while they are putting essential county services on the back burner by refusing to allow departments to fill vital open positions.
But when the bill came up for first reading before the council there was not only no specific information for the public- even after we requested it preceding the meeting- the reading was followed by a perfunctory “don’t worry your pretty little head- we’ve seen a plan... and it’s ok” from Furfaro and Chang.
But the public wasn’t even going to get that much until council watchdog Glenn Mickens got up and asked, as we asked the FAA, “what the f--- is going on“ eliciting the “don’t worry they’re ours” from the two tourism-industry, council-embedded shills.
Presumably if no one said anything the bill would, as we see all the time with “money bills”, go to a pubic hearing, one committee meeting and a final second reading, all without a peep out of anyone on the council or administration on anything but a barest of bones plan for spending... if that.
There is supposedly a plan- something about somehow bribing the “wholesalers” of vacation packages according to Furfaro and Chang who sought to hush Mickens up after his testimony by telling him they’d seen the plan and it was okay with them so shut up sit down and let us worry about it.
Mickens testimony described a few choice past rat holes for tourism promotion money which the industry has conned out of the county without any accountability or measurable “bang for the buck”.
Mickens asked a simple question that people have been asking for years- if we’re going to spend all this money why not do the one thing that will insure we get warm bodies on the ground... distribute vouchers for the tourists themselves for airfare, presumably on any flight into Kaua`i.
But we might never have even heard anything about the idiotic and thread-bare drivel-heavy plan had it not been for an article by a relatively new yet excellent reporter at the local paper, Michael Levine- asking some questions and apparently getting a hold of a “report” of sorts from new county Director of Economic Development George Costa after the meeting.
Levine describes the “plan” which is heavy on vague categorical generalities with a dearth of actual details of distribution of the money or any feedback or accountability mechanism.
Though it’s not apparent whether Levine actually saw a plan or just got a description of it, it appears to be another of these advertising based boondoggles throwing money at a bunch of pre-selected targeted “wholesalers” that will supposedly promote other unlisted pre-selected businesses, presumably corporate off-island owned hotels and tour businesses
Levine writes:
“The main emphasis of the program is working with wholesalers to drive new bookings to Kaua`i over a wide variety of properties and to encourage spending in local businesses through a coupon book that will be created in partnership with the Kaua`i Chamber of Commerce,” he said. “Based on Hawai`i Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism visitor spending statistics, the $500,000 being requested for the marketing program is estimated to generate approximately $15 to 17 million in our island economy.”
Oh, is that the same DBED&T that is slated by some legislators for demolition and is famous for erroneous statistics and throwing STATE money down their rat hole?
The proposal shows that the $500,000 described as “Phase I” would include $250,000 to be split evenly among five wholesale partners or online travel agencies, and the coupon book described by Costa will likely be a part of that plan.
Oh boy- coupon books- a bunch of worthless “buy one get one free” and “free gift with purchase” coupons that are 99% useless crap, as most tourists know.
The proposal listed the top five such partners for Kaua`i as Pleasant Holidays, Expedia, Travelocity, Orbitz and Blue Sky Tours.
And what exactly are we going to do- bribe them to get them to trick people into coming to Kaua`i?.. When you click-on Florida you get Kaua`i? What happens if Honolulu pays them $251,000 to send them to Waikiki?
“Sixty-five percent of our room nights on Kaua`i come from 12 major wholesalers,” said Council Vice Chair Jay Furfaro in response to Mickens’ testimony.
This isn’t being directed at trade shows, he said, it’s being directed at “key customers we refer to as wholesalers.”
Furfaro recently cut all his job-related ties to the tourism industry where he spent his whole life working as an executive, after being continually caught in conflicts of interest, and now that such ties require recusal.
Also included in the proposal was $170,000 for a kama`aina campaign encouraging locals on other Hawaiian Islands to visit Kaua`i, with a special focus on military personnel. The 50th anniversary celebration for South Pacific, scheduled for September, would receive $30,000, and $25,000 apiece would go to a radio show and to Kaua`i Visitors Bureau administration fees.
Oh boy- more advertising... and event support. That’ll work... and if it doesn’t how will we know? As usual the answer to that is unquantifiable... so shut up Parx.
Phase II, which would cost another $500,000 and could be funded through the upcoming budget process, would allocate another $250,000 to five wholesale partners, $170,000 to the kama`aina campaign, $40,000 to a “Northwest Blitz” and $25,000 apiece to a radio show and to Kaua`i Visitors Bureau administration fees.
Yes folks this only fills up half of the rat hole.
Only either a complete idiot or the recipients of kickbacks could possibly think that increasing advertising will get more people to come to Hawai`i or specifically Kaua`i these days.
Presumably these dunderheads have been to the mainland and talked to people there. Have they ever found one person who never heard of Hawai`i much less one who has to be convinced to come here, all else being equal?
Of course not. People on the mainland don’t need to be reminded how much they want to come here, possibly over every other single visitor destination around the world. It’s at the top of the list for everyone’s “dream vacation”.
So what’s stopping them?.. the fact that they didn’t see a 30 second clip of bikini clad beach-goers or fake hula dancers?
What are we- a bunch a freakin idiots? It’s the cost you shemageggis. “Everyone knows” the airfare is outrageous, the hotel rooms and rent-a-cars are out of sight and on and on.
Whether this is actually true doesn’t matter because people belive it is and no amount of advertising saying “no really- it’s not that expensive” will cause them to experience a pissy-foot as rain.
The only thing that will get them here is actual good-as-cash vouchers, as Glenn suggested. And not those lousy restricted ones that can only go to one or two specific business... which have already raised their prices by $200 in anticipation of participating in that kind of scam... a scam most mainlanders have seen and won’t get taken in with again.
$1 million would translate to 5000 $200 vouchers to be used unrestricted on any airline as Glenn suggested.
Actually we’d suggest they be used for any business on Kaua`i too and perhaps use them to leverage a “double your Kaua`i Voucher” program for participating airlines or businesses to get a bigger bang for the buck.
The boneheads in tourism promotion are quite obviously either clueless.. or corrupt.
With no accountability with strictly advertising-based promotions. That assures that there is no feedback mechanism to establish it’s effectiveness in solid verifiable numbers. So they can never be held accountable and hold their jobs forever whether they perform or not.
Just look at this hilarious paragraph from an article in the local paper this weekend from Sue Kanoho executive director of the Kaua`i Visitors Bureau:
The second assumption I often hear is that they think all KVB does is “just place print advertising” to get the word out about Kaua`i. In fact, KVB has a myriad of areas that we focus on to market the island. In addition to print advertising, KVB also does television spots and television programs, radio ads, outdoor advertising, e-marketing, webinars, travel trade advertising, trade shows, product launches, destination training, wholesaler cooperatives, event marketing, familiarization tours, research and last, but not least, and one of the most important elements…. public relations.
Uh, Sue, maybe the problem is that all you can think of to do is advertise, no matter what the medium.
It’s evocative of a line from the movie The Blues Brothers where the patrons of the chicken-wire bar where they’re about to play tell them “We like both kinds of music- country AND western”.
The reason for this mindset is perhaps that they belive the only way to get people here is to con them into doing it, implying that otherwise they would never come.
That may be true of other locales but these marketing geniuses, many of whom come from other places where they cut their visitors destination marketing teeth, have no understanding of the built in desirability of the local product- Hawai`i itself- whether in reality or through the fantasy that mainland denizens hold in their mind of the islands as the ultimate destination.
If you ask them the only obstacle in their minds is cost. So why not give them something real that will also assure the behavior we seek along with a built in unambiguous accounting of where the money went and exactly what we got for it?
Actually we shouldn’t be spending a nickel on promoting someone else’s business- it’s amazing how quickly entrepreneurial free-market zealots turn into promoters of a welfare state when the handout is for them.
But if these gullible politicians feel they have to spend money on tourism promotion it’s time to stop the corrupt kick-back-ready system of advertising a product that couldn’t be any more desirable... unless it were free.
Friday, March 27, 2009
BITE ME
BITE ME: We really should end the week with an emotionally satisfying rant suggesting the bigoted, homophobic, red-shirted troglodytes to shove their jesus and bible up their sociopathic asses so there won’t be room for that army of big hairy phalluses they apparently fear so much.
After all, it’s as obvious as it was a decade ago that you can’t fight the religious passion of mentally ill, deluded, heterosexual degenerates with clear rational logic and calmly reasoned arguments for civil rights.
The fact that “our side” didn’t use this kind of appeal to irrational fears was apparently the downfall of this year’s civil rights battle, just like it was last year in California.
We should have known- clear headed intellectual appeals to “do the right thing” are sooooo 60’s retro.
But blaming the hoodwinked mob for the legislature’s capitulation to hatred and bigotry out of fear for their political careers is to relieve them of the responsibility- and hopefully accountability at the polls- for their shameful acts.
Much in the aftermath has us shaking our heads in disbelief more than at the disgusting abandonment of principle by weasels like Senate President Colleen Hamabusa and her spineless lockstep sycophants.
One of the weirdest claims we’ve read from legislative insiders is that the amazingly fearless Kaua`i Senator Gary Hooser somehow led the battle against ignorance and discrimination in order to somehow further his political ambitions after he announced early this year that he was going to run for lieutenant governor next year.
This claim comes from the self same politicians who claimed they were voting against civil unions because the majority of their constituents were against it.
What are we a bunch of freakin’ idiots? Even if they missed the only scientific poll- which showed massive support for the civil unions legislation- how can they say Hooser was doing it for political gain when they’d have to actually believe that he would lose the votes of that majority opposition through his actions?
We’ve known Gary for 25 years and have rarely if ever been disappointed in any of his actions either on the Kaua`i county council or in the senate- and that’s not something we can say about any other elected official other than Representative Mina Morita.
It has truly boggled our mind as to how he’s been able to pull it off with all the petty little prevaricators and pissants he works with and move into a leadership position to boot.
Which is why we and many other on Kaua`i are in large part hurt that we will certainly have someone of a lesser character as our senator after November 2010.
Many can’t see why someone who has been able to remain principled and effective as a legislator would want to move into any administrative post, much less one that is as useless as an appendix.
The only explanation we can come up with is that maybe he’s just fed up with the stupidity and arcana of his “colleagues” in the Hawai`i state legislature.
Anyone who follows legislative matters has at one time or another been frustrated to the point of tears at the casual acceptance of the inane committee system that perverts the will of the people and even the body year after year after year and the pay-to-play campaign finance laws that perpetuate the inertia.
Allowing one legislator to subvert the will of the majority is the antithesis of democracy in a legislative body. Yet when push came to shove, respect for this corruption and power mongering was shamelessly cited by the senators- the ones who voted no but claimed to actually support civil unions- for refusing to “pull” the bill out of the deadlocked committee.
And yet there’s a shocking silence and distinct lack of outrage in the press- mainstream and otherwise- about the process that led to the ridiculous “only in Hawai`i” denial of civil unions.
The veil has now been lifted on these homophobic slimeballs’ claims that they just wanted “marriage” to be keep from those who have sex differently than they think everyone should.
It’s become painfully obvious they are bent on punishing those who don’t accept their interpretation of a fairy tale penned by cave men as being the literal one-and-only truth.
No other state has, when pressed, denied civil unions with full equal rights for all, even those that, like Hawai`i, constitutionally ban same gender marriage. As a matter of fact the supreme courts of other states have said that the state may constitutionally ban non opposite gender marriage but MUST provide for the same state granted entitlements and benefits for all when doing it.
It’s apparently time to take up the Hawai`i courts’ time again with such a case now that the public knows that asking the legislature to grant equal protection is as useless as reasoning with those with a religious stick up their collective asses.
The concept of “civil unions” is a discriminatory watered down version of the equal right that true marriage. It would certainly seem a no-brainer to get the government out of the marriage business all together and let the babies have their bottle. Let the bible thumpers pervert the minds of their own adherents.
The only protected class that is actually proscribed by a “lifestyle choice” is the one that’s kuleana of the brainless twits who believe the earth is 6000 years old and that people used to live 900 years and live inside fish.
If they want to warp the minds of those who made the choice to join up, well, we’ll all just have to be tolerant of those who “dare to be stupid”.
After all, it’s as obvious as it was a decade ago that you can’t fight the religious passion of mentally ill, deluded, heterosexual degenerates with clear rational logic and calmly reasoned arguments for civil rights.
The fact that “our side” didn’t use this kind of appeal to irrational fears was apparently the downfall of this year’s civil rights battle, just like it was last year in California.
We should have known- clear headed intellectual appeals to “do the right thing” are sooooo 60’s retro.
But blaming the hoodwinked mob for the legislature’s capitulation to hatred and bigotry out of fear for their political careers is to relieve them of the responsibility- and hopefully accountability at the polls- for their shameful acts.
Much in the aftermath has us shaking our heads in disbelief more than at the disgusting abandonment of principle by weasels like Senate President Colleen Hamabusa and her spineless lockstep sycophants.
One of the weirdest claims we’ve read from legislative insiders is that the amazingly fearless Kaua`i Senator Gary Hooser somehow led the battle against ignorance and discrimination in order to somehow further his political ambitions after he announced early this year that he was going to run for lieutenant governor next year.
This claim comes from the self same politicians who claimed they were voting against civil unions because the majority of their constituents were against it.
What are we a bunch of freakin’ idiots? Even if they missed the only scientific poll- which showed massive support for the civil unions legislation- how can they say Hooser was doing it for political gain when they’d have to actually believe that he would lose the votes of that majority opposition through his actions?
We’ve known Gary for 25 years and have rarely if ever been disappointed in any of his actions either on the Kaua`i county council or in the senate- and that’s not something we can say about any other elected official other than Representative Mina Morita.
It has truly boggled our mind as to how he’s been able to pull it off with all the petty little prevaricators and pissants he works with and move into a leadership position to boot.
Which is why we and many other on Kaua`i are in large part hurt that we will certainly have someone of a lesser character as our senator after November 2010.
Many can’t see why someone who has been able to remain principled and effective as a legislator would want to move into any administrative post, much less one that is as useless as an appendix.
The only explanation we can come up with is that maybe he’s just fed up with the stupidity and arcana of his “colleagues” in the Hawai`i state legislature.
Anyone who follows legislative matters has at one time or another been frustrated to the point of tears at the casual acceptance of the inane committee system that perverts the will of the people and even the body year after year after year and the pay-to-play campaign finance laws that perpetuate the inertia.
Allowing one legislator to subvert the will of the majority is the antithesis of democracy in a legislative body. Yet when push came to shove, respect for this corruption and power mongering was shamelessly cited by the senators- the ones who voted no but claimed to actually support civil unions- for refusing to “pull” the bill out of the deadlocked committee.
And yet there’s a shocking silence and distinct lack of outrage in the press- mainstream and otherwise- about the process that led to the ridiculous “only in Hawai`i” denial of civil unions.
The veil has now been lifted on these homophobic slimeballs’ claims that they just wanted “marriage” to be keep from those who have sex differently than they think everyone should.
It’s become painfully obvious they are bent on punishing those who don’t accept their interpretation of a fairy tale penned by cave men as being the literal one-and-only truth.
No other state has, when pressed, denied civil unions with full equal rights for all, even those that, like Hawai`i, constitutionally ban same gender marriage. As a matter of fact the supreme courts of other states have said that the state may constitutionally ban non opposite gender marriage but MUST provide for the same state granted entitlements and benefits for all when doing it.
It’s apparently time to take up the Hawai`i courts’ time again with such a case now that the public knows that asking the legislature to grant equal protection is as useless as reasoning with those with a religious stick up their collective asses.
The concept of “civil unions” is a discriminatory watered down version of the equal right that true marriage. It would certainly seem a no-brainer to get the government out of the marriage business all together and let the babies have their bottle. Let the bible thumpers pervert the minds of their own adherents.
The only protected class that is actually proscribed by a “lifestyle choice” is the one that’s kuleana of the brainless twits who believe the earth is 6000 years old and that people used to live 900 years and live inside fish.
If they want to warp the minds of those who made the choice to join up, well, we’ll all just have to be tolerant of those who “dare to be stupid”.
Friday, March 20, 2009
USED GUIDE DOG FOR SALE
USED GUIDE DOG FOR SALE: How could we all have been so wrong for so long?
It’s painfully obvious now that conclusions, even though based on the reams of data, that the Hawai`i Superferry (HSf) was nothing but a demonstration prototype for a new class of military war ships were nothing but the rantings of a bunch of stupid hippie environmentalists grasping at straws.
The illumination came directly from an unimpeachable source- Superferry president and chief executive officer- and former Navy Admiral- Thomas Fargo who would certainly have no reason to lie to or BS anyone.
Barely choking back crocodile tears, before the “final voyage” of the Superferry, Fargo set everyone straight.
According to the Honolulu Advertiser:
Fargo, after mentioning that the military might want to lease the Alakai, addressed speculation by some activists who have opposed the project that Superferry was designed from the start as a military operation.
"That's absolutely not true," said Fargo, a former Navy admiral. "We certainly wouldn't have gone to the trouble to paint Alakai in the manner that we did, to appoint her with 836 first-class seats, to spend the huge sums of money that we did to establish service here in Hawaii if that was our goal.
"The goal that's unmistakable was to provide regular and reliable commercial ferry service in these Islands."
And, in a phone interview directly from the deck of the boat with the local Kaua`i paper’s Michael Levine, Fargo let us misinformed misanthropes know that this was no causal remark.
Levine says:
Asked about the possibility that the Alakai would be sold to the military, Fargo took umbrage at the implication that it the Superferry was designed for military purposes all along.
“I want to make one thing perfectly clear because this has been misunderstood from the get-go. All these theories that it had something to do with the military are bogus,” he said. “We wouldn’t have painted, branded, and carpeted (the ship), put 831 first-class seats and spent all this money if we wanted to lease it to the military. That logic is absolutely flawed. The conspiracy theories ... are a bunch of baloney.”
Of course- how could we have been so blind? All we had to do was look at the paint job. It was right on the boat... “Hawai`i Superferry”. obviously if it were really for military use it would have said “War Ship Prototype- Military Boondoggle”.
And whose ever heard of painting over anything- that lettering was obviously done with permanent paint. It must have cost at least, why, hundreds of dollars to paint the words and logo on an almost $400 million boat.
Of course those seats couldn’t serve anyone else but ferry passengers. They quite obviously are irremovably and permanently embedded on the ship. Those “first class appointments” could only serve civilians because, as everyone knows, soldiers always stand at attention and never sit down.
But the carpeting- well that cinches it. That stuff is impossible to replace. And who would want to with all the vomit stains?
Apparently we were just bamboozled by these awful conspiracy theorists. because, well Fargo says it was all a “bunch of baloney” and what possible reason would we have to not take a Superferry official at their word?
It’s all falling into place now.
It was apparently just a coincidence that back in 2000 Hawai`i Senator Daniel Inouye and Senator and convicted felon Ted Stevens of Alaska “earmarked” $10 million to study the feasibility of high-speed large-capacity ferries in Hawai`i and Alaska at the very same time when, as the ranking member of the Senate Armed services committee, he was first considering Navy plans for a new fleet of high speed large capacity vessels virtually indistinguishable from the ferry- a plan which called for spending 10’s of billions on the war ships that were yet to be designed or built.
Then, it certainly wasn’t in anticipation of cashing in when Australian ship builder set up shop in Mobile Alabama where they could compete to design and build the military vessels because, unlike ferries, the war ships had to be built in America.
They came to build us a ferry.
The fact that the ferry was the first aluminum-hulled, high-speed vessel of that size and with a catamaran design- identical to the description the Navy used for their proposed project- was quite obviously part of a fallacious post hoc- proctor hoc argument by anti US military commies.
Austal was obviously only coming to the US because they love Americans so much and just wanted to come and build a ferry for Hawai`i, even if their initial investment in setting up the ship was many times the amount the ferry cost and there was no contract in place for even the ferry. Why everyone knows that all corporations like Austal are really just benevolent public service organizations and don’t ever consider anything based purely on profit motive.
Of course it was just a happy coincidence that the first and only major funding for the ferry came from former Navy Secretary John Lehman. Because it was certainly of no note at all that congressional records show that they were reluctant to spend a nickel on the new design because they didn’t know if it would really be able to stand up to shallow water and close shore maneuvering... or for that matter if the unique design would even float.
It’s all too clear that the real story is the original story. The one they’ve told all along and are “sticking to” today as they ready the ship for military use: some guy who had never heard of high-speed high-capacity ferries identical to the Navy’s design went to Europe, saw a ferry and said “I’m gonna run an outlandishly big, untested and never-built-before ferry to go between islands in Hawai`i”.
The fact that he had no background in ferries, mutli-hundred-million dollar businesses or any money personally to invest is irrelevant. It had to work because he was “an entrepreneur”.
This could never have been just a cover story in anyone’s wildest dreams- even though Inouye had already appropriated the money for the study before the idea was even proposed and was one of the first to immediately support the idea.
Why even Superferry opponents like Koohan Paik and Jerry Mander say that’s the true origin of the HSf, as they wrote over and over in their book “The Superferry Chronicles”. Who are we to question the story if they bought it?.... It doesn’t matter that almost every bit of information cited in the book came from secondary and tertiary rather than original sources.
Now we know it’s the only thing in the book they got right.
It’s obvious the whole project was and always has been driven forward solely in the name of serving the people of Hawai`i. The fact that Lehman et. al. put pressure on the federal government to demand an exemption from state mandated environmental studies before they would guarantee a loan had nothing to do with the urgency to move the project forward and get the boat in the water as quickly as possible to show congress that the “ferry” would withstand actual service.... that’s would be just preposterous
What possible motivation, other than helping people to take their car and travel to see their auntie on another island, could a former Secretary of the Navy have had?
And certainly it was just because Governor Linda Lingle really liked the Superferry honcho John Garibaldi so much that she risked and eventually destroyed her political career to pressure the state bureaucrats to acquiesce to flouting the law in order to rush an oversized, biggest-ferry-in-the-world into service... despite the fact that it was comparatively horribly expensive to operate and had unless capacity... not to mention the sticker shocking price.
Why all that sucking up to people dealing in multi billion-dollar contracts could never result in a lucrative position when Lingle term-limits run out in 2010. Because pols who make corrupt decisions and show themselves to be willing cogs in a boondoggle never get rewarded with multi-million dollar revolving door consulting jobs after leaving office
It was all just speculation when articles appeared in the military-contracting trade magazines quoting Austal officials, U.S. congressional members and military planners talking about wanting to see how the HSf stands up to use before they go forward with the new class of Navy ships based on that almost identical design. After all, everyone knows that trade magazines like that that people rely on to make billion dollar investments are all just opinion rags.
Just because it was the first one and sailed around for a year before congress and Senator Inouye- now chair of the armed forces appropriation sub committee- allowed the project to start slowly going forward doesn’t mean a thing.
And we all know how dumb Lehman, Inouye, Fargo and everyone else involved are. They would never have been smart enough to plot to operate for a year or so without an EIS for a boat that any moron could tell you would severely effect the environment in ways that can’t be mitigated (especially at zero cost for infrastructural support).
They could never have schemed to nix the studies so they could pull out, sell the boat to the military and sue the state for letting them do it when the courts unanimously laughed at the state’s attempts to con everyone.
The fact that they ignored the first Supreme Court ruling as long as they could- and then got the legislature to illegally let them show off the boat by running it for a year while opponents went back to court- yet this time after the recent ruling they shut down on a dime, doesn’t mean a thing.
The record shows that they are obviously just good citizens who always respect the law and the court rulings.
Why how could they have foreseen that they would get to operate long enough to show the boats viability then get nixed by the courts?... you’d have to believe they have ESP or are psychic.
We all know that senators and military-contracting ex-admirals would never be able plot anything so complex.
And anyway, they would never scam idiotic twits like Lingle, Attorney General Bennett and most of the members of the state legislature. No one would do that just for money- why it would be wrong and the military never does anything wrong- just think of how righteous the Vietnam and Iraq wars were.
Besides, they had no way of knowing that there were plenty of greedy, self-centered mainland marauders living in Honolulu who would jump at the chance to treat the environmentally sensitive and infrastructure-poor neighbor islands like their personal playground and toilet and plunder the resources, trash the place and go home.
Why Americans can always be counted on to put their own self-interest aside and do what’s for the good of others. When people ask them not to overrun and despoil someone else’s neck of the woods Americans never just call them NIMBY’s, push them aside and take what they want with no regard for anyone but themselves.
So they certainly couldn’t count on all that happening. It was just a happy coincidence that the greedy pigs put on enough political pressure to force the state’s Minotaurs at the legislature and in the administration to do what was wrong as long as they could.
Yup- Fargo has opened everyone’s eyes to our silly evidence-based conclusions.
We who thought there was ever any connection between the Hawai`i Superferry Inc. and the military simply made the common mistake of believing’ our own lyin’ eyes instead of the words of those always trustworthy PR hacks and corrupt military personnel and contractors.
Even though their wieners are out and there’s a distinct and overpowering pissy stench of ammonia coming from our feet, apparently it’s just raining.
It’s painfully obvious now that conclusions, even though based on the reams of data, that the Hawai`i Superferry (HSf) was nothing but a demonstration prototype for a new class of military war ships were nothing but the rantings of a bunch of stupid hippie environmentalists grasping at straws.
The illumination came directly from an unimpeachable source- Superferry president and chief executive officer- and former Navy Admiral- Thomas Fargo who would certainly have no reason to lie to or BS anyone.
Barely choking back crocodile tears, before the “final voyage” of the Superferry, Fargo set everyone straight.
According to the Honolulu Advertiser:
Fargo, after mentioning that the military might want to lease the Alakai, addressed speculation by some activists who have opposed the project that Superferry was designed from the start as a military operation.
"That's absolutely not true," said Fargo, a former Navy admiral. "We certainly wouldn't have gone to the trouble to paint Alakai in the manner that we did, to appoint her with 836 first-class seats, to spend the huge sums of money that we did to establish service here in Hawaii if that was our goal.
"The goal that's unmistakable was to provide regular and reliable commercial ferry service in these Islands."
And, in a phone interview directly from the deck of the boat with the local Kaua`i paper’s Michael Levine, Fargo let us misinformed misanthropes know that this was no causal remark.
Levine says:
Asked about the possibility that the Alakai would be sold to the military, Fargo took umbrage at the implication that it the Superferry was designed for military purposes all along.
“I want to make one thing perfectly clear because this has been misunderstood from the get-go. All these theories that it had something to do with the military are bogus,” he said. “We wouldn’t have painted, branded, and carpeted (the ship), put 831 first-class seats and spent all this money if we wanted to lease it to the military. That logic is absolutely flawed. The conspiracy theories ... are a bunch of baloney.”
Of course- how could we have been so blind? All we had to do was look at the paint job. It was right on the boat... “Hawai`i Superferry”. obviously if it were really for military use it would have said “War Ship Prototype- Military Boondoggle”.
And whose ever heard of painting over anything- that lettering was obviously done with permanent paint. It must have cost at least, why, hundreds of dollars to paint the words and logo on an almost $400 million boat.
Of course those seats couldn’t serve anyone else but ferry passengers. They quite obviously are irremovably and permanently embedded on the ship. Those “first class appointments” could only serve civilians because, as everyone knows, soldiers always stand at attention and never sit down.
But the carpeting- well that cinches it. That stuff is impossible to replace. And who would want to with all the vomit stains?
Apparently we were just bamboozled by these awful conspiracy theorists. because, well Fargo says it was all a “bunch of baloney” and what possible reason would we have to not take a Superferry official at their word?
It’s all falling into place now.
It was apparently just a coincidence that back in 2000 Hawai`i Senator Daniel Inouye and Senator and convicted felon Ted Stevens of Alaska “earmarked” $10 million to study the feasibility of high-speed large-capacity ferries in Hawai`i and Alaska at the very same time when, as the ranking member of the Senate Armed services committee, he was first considering Navy plans for a new fleet of high speed large capacity vessels virtually indistinguishable from the ferry- a plan which called for spending 10’s of billions on the war ships that were yet to be designed or built.
Then, it certainly wasn’t in anticipation of cashing in when Australian ship builder set up shop in Mobile Alabama where they could compete to design and build the military vessels because, unlike ferries, the war ships had to be built in America.
They came to build us a ferry.
The fact that the ferry was the first aluminum-hulled, high-speed vessel of that size and with a catamaran design- identical to the description the Navy used for their proposed project- was quite obviously part of a fallacious post hoc- proctor hoc argument by anti US military commies.
Austal was obviously only coming to the US because they love Americans so much and just wanted to come and build a ferry for Hawai`i, even if their initial investment in setting up the ship was many times the amount the ferry cost and there was no contract in place for even the ferry. Why everyone knows that all corporations like Austal are really just benevolent public service organizations and don’t ever consider anything based purely on profit motive.
Of course it was just a happy coincidence that the first and only major funding for the ferry came from former Navy Secretary John Lehman. Because it was certainly of no note at all that congressional records show that they were reluctant to spend a nickel on the new design because they didn’t know if it would really be able to stand up to shallow water and close shore maneuvering... or for that matter if the unique design would even float.
It’s all too clear that the real story is the original story. The one they’ve told all along and are “sticking to” today as they ready the ship for military use: some guy who had never heard of high-speed high-capacity ferries identical to the Navy’s design went to Europe, saw a ferry and said “I’m gonna run an outlandishly big, untested and never-built-before ferry to go between islands in Hawai`i”.
The fact that he had no background in ferries, mutli-hundred-million dollar businesses or any money personally to invest is irrelevant. It had to work because he was “an entrepreneur”.
This could never have been just a cover story in anyone’s wildest dreams- even though Inouye had already appropriated the money for the study before the idea was even proposed and was one of the first to immediately support the idea.
Why even Superferry opponents like Koohan Paik and Jerry Mander say that’s the true origin of the HSf, as they wrote over and over in their book “The Superferry Chronicles”. Who are we to question the story if they bought it?.... It doesn’t matter that almost every bit of information cited in the book came from secondary and tertiary rather than original sources.
Now we know it’s the only thing in the book they got right.
It’s obvious the whole project was and always has been driven forward solely in the name of serving the people of Hawai`i. The fact that Lehman et. al. put pressure on the federal government to demand an exemption from state mandated environmental studies before they would guarantee a loan had nothing to do with the urgency to move the project forward and get the boat in the water as quickly as possible to show congress that the “ferry” would withstand actual service.... that’s would be just preposterous
What possible motivation, other than helping people to take their car and travel to see their auntie on another island, could a former Secretary of the Navy have had?
And certainly it was just because Governor Linda Lingle really liked the Superferry honcho John Garibaldi so much that she risked and eventually destroyed her political career to pressure the state bureaucrats to acquiesce to flouting the law in order to rush an oversized, biggest-ferry-in-the-world into service... despite the fact that it was comparatively horribly expensive to operate and had unless capacity... not to mention the sticker shocking price.
Why all that sucking up to people dealing in multi billion-dollar contracts could never result in a lucrative position when Lingle term-limits run out in 2010. Because pols who make corrupt decisions and show themselves to be willing cogs in a boondoggle never get rewarded with multi-million dollar revolving door consulting jobs after leaving office
It was all just speculation when articles appeared in the military-contracting trade magazines quoting Austal officials, U.S. congressional members and military planners talking about wanting to see how the HSf stands up to use before they go forward with the new class of Navy ships based on that almost identical design. After all, everyone knows that trade magazines like that that people rely on to make billion dollar investments are all just opinion rags.
Just because it was the first one and sailed around for a year before congress and Senator Inouye- now chair of the armed forces appropriation sub committee- allowed the project to start slowly going forward doesn’t mean a thing.
And we all know how dumb Lehman, Inouye, Fargo and everyone else involved are. They would never have been smart enough to plot to operate for a year or so without an EIS for a boat that any moron could tell you would severely effect the environment in ways that can’t be mitigated (especially at zero cost for infrastructural support).
They could never have schemed to nix the studies so they could pull out, sell the boat to the military and sue the state for letting them do it when the courts unanimously laughed at the state’s attempts to con everyone.
The fact that they ignored the first Supreme Court ruling as long as they could- and then got the legislature to illegally let them show off the boat by running it for a year while opponents went back to court- yet this time after the recent ruling they shut down on a dime, doesn’t mean a thing.
The record shows that they are obviously just good citizens who always respect the law and the court rulings.
Why how could they have foreseen that they would get to operate long enough to show the boats viability then get nixed by the courts?... you’d have to believe they have ESP or are psychic.
We all know that senators and military-contracting ex-admirals would never be able plot anything so complex.
And anyway, they would never scam idiotic twits like Lingle, Attorney General Bennett and most of the members of the state legislature. No one would do that just for money- why it would be wrong and the military never does anything wrong- just think of how righteous the Vietnam and Iraq wars were.
Besides, they had no way of knowing that there were plenty of greedy, self-centered mainland marauders living in Honolulu who would jump at the chance to treat the environmentally sensitive and infrastructure-poor neighbor islands like their personal playground and toilet and plunder the resources, trash the place and go home.
Why Americans can always be counted on to put their own self-interest aside and do what’s for the good of others. When people ask them not to overrun and despoil someone else’s neck of the woods Americans never just call them NIMBY’s, push them aside and take what they want with no regard for anyone but themselves.
So they certainly couldn’t count on all that happening. It was just a happy coincidence that the greedy pigs put on enough political pressure to force the state’s Minotaurs at the legislature and in the administration to do what was wrong as long as they could.
Yup- Fargo has opened everyone’s eyes to our silly evidence-based conclusions.
We who thought there was ever any connection between the Hawai`i Superferry Inc. and the military simply made the common mistake of believing’ our own lyin’ eyes instead of the words of those always trustworthy PR hacks and corrupt military personnel and contractors.
Even though their wieners are out and there’s a distinct and overpowering pissy stench of ammonia coming from our feet, apparently it’s just raining.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
STIMULATE THIS
STIMULATE THIS: It doesn’t take a comedian to come up with “shovel-ready” punchlines.
And it doesn’t take an especially sharp type of farm implement to uncover the bovine byproduct we’re being spoon-fed in the steam-shovel load of money being dished out to the state and local governments across the county to supposedly “create jobs”.
Because although you haven’t really heard it said much by anyone in D.C. and won’t hear it from all the county’s governors and mayors, the whole “public works project” aspect of the “stimulus” bill- being ceremonially signed as we write- won’t produce one “job” that wasn’t there already.
Thanks to the new Stimulus Watch web site there’s an actual statewide list of the local Hawai`i projects and if Kauai County is any example the registry is simply an inventory of already funded projects, leaving the money to go to wish-list, nice-to-have but don’t need-to-have local undertakings.
The shell game is the same as the one being played by the “winning” banks that used the money they got in the $700 billion TARP bailout to buy up the “losing” banks that didn’t get bailout money- like when Wells Fargo that purchased Wachovia- all so they could still pay huge executive bonuses and keep their shareholders’ pockets “shovel ready”.
The line that “we didn’t use THAT money” to buy the other bank and for all the other stuff they shouldn’t be doing is about as credible as the old joke about the guy in Las Vegas who asks a stranger for twenty bucks for food.
“No” says the stranger “you’ll just gamble it away”,
“No I won’t” says the beggar, ”I got gamblin’ money”.
According to stimulus watch, Kaua`i is asking for $102,384,000 for projects on a list of 27 undertakings, all of which have either been funded in previous years’ operating and capital improvement budgets or are on the list of projects that are to be paid for by money from the recent and upcoming bond floats..
Although the stimulus watch’s FAQ section doesn’t say anything about why the order of projects listed are presented that way, topping the Kaua`i list is, absurdly enough, $3,800,000 for the “Lydgate-Kapaa Bike Path and Associated Facility (Kamalani Pavilion) Repair”.(the links go to a page where you can “vote” on whether you think it’s a “critical” project and comment).
gw? and local newspaper readers won’t have to ask what the problems are with this one. The “bike path” -or should we say “dog path”- boondoggle has run out of the “free money” (read federal transportation money that put us at the bottom of the list for future highway funding at the time and so delaying a fix for Kapa`a traffic gridlock), as the funding was claimed to be at the time.
But here we have money for “repairs” to the path and “linear park” that was just completed a couple of years ago.
The next is a real emergency- $2,500,000 for the Aliomanu Emergency Road Repair- the place on the road to Anini where the road is about to be, and already is in places, falling into the ocean due to natural erosion
But of course it is still a controversial fix because it is a “shoreline hardening” project and although the county can claim it’s an “emergency repair” and get around Army Corps of Engineers' permitting requirements it’s not as clear how that would apply if federal funds are involved.
Also the project is being done instead of moving the road inland- a much more permanent “fix” that has been discussed but would be much more costly.
Then there’s one that has really peaked the interest of council watchdog Glenn Mickens- $2.5 million for Islandwide County Road Resurfacing Projects. Though it’s not clear what this refers to it is apparently not more money to repave the roads the right way or more often but rather represents the regular yearly road resurfacing budget.
The way we do it on Kauai`- as opposed to the right way the rest of the country uses- is a prime example of our penny-wise, pound-foolish county budgeting. We repave our roads in a substandard way so that they last half as long and require exponentially more money to maintain down the road (pun intended) as we reported on last March
Sometime in the near future we’ll run Mickens' response to this after he spent the last 15 years trying to convince the council it’s being not just stupid in it’s paving methodology or corrupt in repaving the road the mayor lives on every single year, but blind to- or perhaps complicit in- a scam where it’s apparently being shorted by the contractors who delivers the asphalt.
But this is a perfect example of what we’re talking about. All this does is free up $2.5 million dollars in the county budget so that the council can go behind the semi-closed doors of the non-televised budget process to potentially spend it on pet projects.
Skipping around there’s an already funded:
-$660,000 for an Emergency Reinforcement of Opaekaa Bridge and Puuopae Bridge,
-$12 million for the Waimea Wastewater Treatment Plant Expansion,
-$9 million for the Kekaha Landfill Lateral Expansion,
-$5 million for the New Kealia Fire Station,
-$3 million for Bus Fleet Expansion and
-1 million for Bus Fleet Replacements- and a bunch of others,
all of which have been funded already in either the recent or an upcoming bond float or in recent or this year’s capital improvement budgets.
And of course there’s one that if the council has a say will probably be tops on their list-$5 million for the Historic County Building Restoration and Renovation, the subject of the apparently illegal executive session we reported on yesterday..
There’s actually not much wrong with most of these and the rest of the county projects- they are all, with a couple of notable exceptions, things the county should and needs to provide its people.
And most likely, in the context of the plummeting property values a’comin’, the money to do them will simply not be there unless the real property tax rate is jacked up to maintain the actual revenue the county has been used to receiving and taken advantage of during the land speculation boom.
The scam here is that it’s all being sold as a quasi project-specific money bill from congress to “create jobs” through some kind of massive public works project.
Rather than look at each individual project and have the local jurisdictions decide on specific projects that might not otherwise be funded (as the bill was originally intended) the sheeple in their typical media-fed fish-hook-in-the-side-of-the-mouth way rebelled against what we were told was “pork-pork-pork-pork-pork” in the form of “earmarks-earmarks-earmarks-earmarks-earmarks” every time we clicked from news channel to news channel.
That made for a “no pork- no earmarks” bill where the projects couldn’t be designated in the bill specifically and given only for needed but potentially unfunded – and dare we say it “green”- infrastructural ventures, but in lump sums for the local pols to divvy up for whatever they chose by robbing Peter to pay Paul.
Because of course, we got gamblin’ money.
If Kaua`i is any example the lack of a positive-integer to indicate the number of jobs actually created- in that they wouldn’t be there without the “stimulus bill”- then once again, everyone of us should be asking ourselves “what am I- a freakin’ idiot?”.
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