Letters for Sunday – June 18, 2006
• Iraq civil war is deja vu
• Research before criticizing
• Subscriber feels censored
• Strikebreakers will be costly
Iraq civil war is deja vu
Has Diana West gone totally insane? (The Garden Island, Media Voices, June 10) She claims our mission in Iraq is accomplished. We captured Saddam … yes we did … and destroyed his Weapons of Mass Destruction program. What weapons of mass destruction program, Diana? The truth is we invaded a defenseless country which had nothing to do with the 9/11 terrorist attack, and which presented no threat to us or the rest of the world. Saddam was a miserable little dictator, but Iraq was a secular Muslim State, hated by its repressive Islamic neighbors, struggling with sanctions, but living in relative peace.
For almost a year a civil war between the Shias and the Sunnis … crippling, repressive Islamic sects … have been tearing the country to pieces.
It’s deja vu all over again. Just as in Vietnam our poor troops can’t tell the good guys from the bad guys … if there are any good guys in this miserable mess. Our gallant kids are under stress the likes of which none of us, who support them and love this country, can even imagine. We are in control of nothing in that country, not even the Green Zone in Baghdad. There is no place safe. Baghdad is the most violent city on earth. We are killing innocent civilians and our poor battered young people for what, Diana? Iraq is in more trouble now than it was under Saddam. That’s the truth. We have given the militant Shias weapons, and in masks they terrorize the country. The nutty Sunnis fight back. We kill Sunnis and Shias cheer; we kill Shias and Sunnis cheer. There are no nonsectarians in Iraq, you are either one or the other of this mad religion and the Iraq people suffer every minute of every hour of every day while the world watches the chaos George has made of the Mid East …
No sane leader of this country would have attacked Iraq after 9/11. Just think, Diana, of all the little countries in the world waiting breathlessly for George to hand them democracy on a platter of bombs and Bibles. You can lie to yourself and the gullible people of America, Diana, but you can’t lie to the people of the world and those of us who love our country more than you can even imagine. We dare to speak out as our leaders — greedy, corrupt, religious fanatic idiots … destroy the beauty and pride and honor for which it once stood. Truth, good sense and sanity seep slowly up from the people. Insanity, stupidity and lies cascade from the top like filthy water from a broken dam. Diana West and William Rusher, far-right columnists and think tank types, and others of their vicious ilk, would rationalize the Crucifixion if their boy George had a part in it.
- Bettejo Dux
Kalaheo
Research before criticizing
I keep reading over and over the same criticisms of vacation rentals and real estate people in this Forum. They are blamed for the high cost of housing on Kaua‘i. Well, sorry, folks, it just isn’t so. Firstly, if those writers would look at the studies on this issue published on the Kauai County website, they might see that single family vacation rentals comprise only 2% of all housing on Kaua‘i. Not the glut that some folks seem to believe. And it’s not the Realtors who are dragging wealthy buyers to Kaua‘i either. The true cause for the rise in real estate prices here is the desirability of our island. In economic terms that’s known as demand. Couple that with the pervasive, anti-development attitude here that makes any sort of development, affordable or otherwise, overly long, difficult and expensive, and we have a real problem. To many of the people either moving or buying a house here, a $650,000+ sales price is reasonable and affordable in comparison to where they come from. It’s pure supply-and-demand folks. The demand is way up and we have a limited supply so what happens? Right! The price goes up. And do you really think anyone, local or otherwise, is going to sell their house at less than the highest price they can get? That’s why communism is a failure. It goes against human nature. Hence, the prices are rising with all real estate here, not just the 2% or so of the houses that are in vacation rental. So, if you’re going to bash something, do a little research first and not shoot from the hip.
The thought I’ve been having that might at least make some headway in lessening the demand for affordable housing is to go like crazy to help Hawaiian families get into homes on the plentiful Hawaiian Homelands. That would remove them from the housing market and maybe make a dent, albeit a temporary one, on reducing the competition for housing. Just a thought. Maybe another hip shot.
- Phil Keat
Honolulu and Makaweli
Subscriber feels censored
I would like to add my voice to that of Peter Saker’s (The Garden Island letters, June 17 ). I, too, will not be renewing my subscription, now that my current one has expired, and for much the same reasons Saker mentions.
It is rather obvious, to those who pay attention, that the Letters section is a sounding board for those on the left who are so obsessed with hate for our president that they are delusional.
Unable to restrain their hate, they not only make claims that are unsubstantiated and have no basis in fact, they are indeed nothing more than the parroting of radical, anti-Bush left-wing liberal talking points.
The few times my responses to those letters get printed, the site sources that provide the facts that refute the claims of the deluded are edited out, essentially making my letter meaningless. I include Web sites that back up my claims because it is virtually impossible to make the refutations within the framework of the word limit. Yet I notice that other letters, many which are obviously more than 300 words, will reference Web sites.
Editing a letter is one thing, but when that editing removes the sources that the writer cites to prove the points he/she makes are valid, then that is censorship, and I will not continue to support a publication that not only practices censorship, but which also exhibits a bias towards those who don’t agree with the delusional leftists in this country.
- Kent Gibboney Kapa‘a
Strikebreakers will be costly
The money grubbing absentee owners of our local heath care facilities are willing to spend millions of dollars to recruit strikebreakers, rather than give consideration to the reasonable requirements of our dedicated nurses to provide the kinds of services that we Kauians need and deserve.
This attitude is symptomatic of the sad state of the availability of health care throughout the United States. It’s hard to believe that our hospitals have stockholders who are willing to put profits before people, but it’s a fact of life. Yet anyone who advocates any kind of a national health care system which would be available at an affordable cost to all Americans is labelled an advocate of “socialized medicine.”
If the corporate beancounters force our hardworking, dedicated nurses to go on strike, every ablebodied Kauian should join them on the picket line in defiance of absentee corporate management of our local health system.
In addition, management should be advised that state law requires that anyone recruiting replacements for strikers must inform the people that they intend to recruit that a labor dispute exists at the facility for which they are being hired.
- Harry Boranian
Lihue
Strikebreakers will be costly
The money grubbing absentee owners of our local heath care facilities are willing to spend millions of dollars to recruit strikebreakers, rather than give consideration to the reasonable requirements of our dedicated nurses to provide the kinds of services that we Kauians need and deserve.
This attitude is symptomatic of the sad state of the availability of health care throughout the United States. It’s hard to believe that our hospitals have stockholders who are willing to put profits before people, but it’s a fact of life. Yet anyone who advocates any kind of a national health care system which would be available at an affordable cost to all Americans is labelled an advocate of “socialized medicine.”
If the corporate beancounters force our hardworking, dedicated nurses to go on strike, every ablebodied Kauian should join them on the picket line in defiance of absentee corporate management of our local health system.
In addition, management should be advised that state law requires that anyone recruiting replacements for strikers must inform the people that they intend to recruit that a labor dispute exists at the facility for which they are being hired.
- Harry Boranian
Lihue
