Helping Kaua‘i houseless brings eviction notice
The birth of a six-pound baby girl and papers to appear in court for eviction proceedings, all on the same day!
On July 6, 2021, Kaua‘i families were evicted from Salt Pond Beach Park, where they had been living for the past year. On the day of the eviction, I went down to Salt Pond park, bringing banana bread and ice water. I found several keiki, dogs and cats in cages and kupuna on the side of the road. All with nowhere to go.
As darkness approached we invited everyone back to our home. We have the perfect property that could accommodate everybody. I told my husband that I felt like we were building Noah’s Ark and they’re coming!
Electricity, running water, cooking area and the porta-toilet. You couldn’t ask for a better setup to handle families that have been displaced.
These families staying with us are Hawaiians born and raised here on Kaua‘i. They are direct descendants of King Kaumuali’i.
My husband and I have learned so much in this process. We have both been very blessed by a very caring and sharing Kaua‘i community. And, yes, we would do it all over again! Wish our landlords could show some aloha. Look forward to seeing them in court.
Marcia Leialoha, Waimea
Doom and gloom forever
Laurel Brier’s Sunday, Sept. 5 missive about the end of the world in four years (wait, I thought it was 12, according to the climate guru Greta Thunberg) is littered with deadly predictions, lots of generalities and very little substance. So, after some research, I have some concrete ways to reduce greenhouse gases:
1. The average person passes 0.5 to 2 liters of methane a day. So, globally, we produce 14,125,866 pounds of methane a year. So, the answer to this massive production of methane is everyone stops eating, thus they stop passing gas. Well, if this is not workable, we change our diet;
2. The estimate is that the cows produce 1,000 times as much methane as humans so, obviously, slaughter all the beef and dairy cattle, no meat, no dairy, but we saved billions of tons of methane. Now, since our major source of protein is gone, we need more plant-based proteins;
3. But wait, she wants to eliminate the large factory farms and industrial agriculture that produce most of our fruits, vegetables and grains and go to “regional, regenerative agriculture,” whatever that is. Guess we just eat bread, but wait:
4. It is estimated that each pound of bread produces 1.1 pounds of carbon dioxide. In the U.S., we eat an average of 53 pounds of bread per person a year, so 19,297,300,000 pounds of CO2 is released. Obviously, we need to stop this tragedy immediately;
5. In the U.S. alone, we consume 56 billion liters of soda a year. Each liter has .065 pounds of CO2, so we release 3,657,550,000 pounds of CO2. Soda has to go, but the beer stays;
6. So we can’t buy food, but at least we can hop in our electric car and go and fish? But wait: Nationally, only 20 % of our electricity is from renewable sources, and she wants to immediately stop producing fossil fuels (gas, oil and natural gas)? So, how do we charge our electric cars?
7. Forget anything made from plastic, since that comes from the now-banned oil and natural gas. Nearly 40% of our oil consumption is used in industrial production. And don’t get sick, because a large majority or our medicines are produced with chemicals that come from: You guessed it, oil!
Naturally, the answer is for the government to spend $3.5 trillion, with only about 15% having anything to do with actually helping the environment. The rest is a long-term social-engineering con to make us into a totally socialist nation, upending our lives and putting them in control of the government and the people in search of everlasting power! So, as you ponder your last four years, pop a soda or beer, make a sandwich, and take your last drive to the beach. Maybe even mow your lawn while you can still get a can of gas. Anybody know where I can buy a goat?
Barry Dittler, Kapa‘a
Good one Barry…let’s see…don’t forget that for Thanksgiving the green bean casserole is history. An those people in Boston…well the Saturday night tradition of beans and franks is as bad as a swear word.
Why don’t we just get reasonable and do what we want in moderation?
Oops, I forgot those nasty beans ! Now those are real methane producers. Heavens, imagine the methane output in Boston alone !
Will you accept Social Security and Medicare? Democratic Socialism works well as evidenced by most other 1st world countries. What’s wrong with providing health care to all citizens like many other countries do including our neighbor to the north, Canada? On another note, do you think it’s normal for the crazy weather patterns and melting ice packs over the last decade? Another person who thinks they know more than the vast majority of scientists who have devoted their lives to studying climate change. What are your credentials? Keep on denying. You probably think Covid is a hoax and vaccines make you grow a second head as well.
Regardless we must immediately ban bean burritos!! We all know it make us into virtual methane cattle.
Aloha is alive and well… kapu aloha will get us through these crazy proceedings that are all kapukai… many pule, walking with Akua for the mediation process and your lawful complaints to have all notice dismissal due to failure to abid by terms of agreement from….
The acting landlord.
In response to Barry “no can” Dittler:
Your first paragraph, a gross over-exaggeration, demonstrates your dishonest argument style and allows us to see your true colors from the start, so thanks for that, I guess,
Your first point is irrelevant. Your second is slightly more relevant, but we have methods for lessening bovine methane, and ways of containing it. So you really should look into that.
At the third point, yeah, we could do with more locally produced foods. How can you not see various benefits from that? And if you can’t imagine what “regional, regenerative agriculture” is, perhaps spend time looking it up before condemning it.
Back to being irrelevant with point #4…
But onto the fifth, yeah, everyone knows we as a culture could do with less sodas. What really is your problem there?
At point 6, do you really think that continuing on with fossil fuels at this rate is good? If there were a no-cost way to immediately swap over, would you do that? If no, I think we’d all really like an explanation of how you think that’s best.
At point 7, yeah, we’ve had way too much plastic in the last few decades. There needs to be some accountability. Or maybe you’ve never walked along the beach…
Finally, you take issue with the proposed expense of a bill that would address some of these things. It’s cost is less than half that of the normal defense spending we already have in place. And we spend more than everyone else on the planet. A LOT more. Maybe some priorities need to be re-evaluated. You think you can do that?
James, chill. It was satire and meant mostly to be funny ! As for Social Security and Medicare, those are not really social programs. You pay for them out of your salary all your life, so the government can take all the interest. It is only a real social program when you contribute nothing and get something in return, and someone ELSE pays for it !
Since you posted where you did… I’ll reply with: you don’t seem to know what social programs means.
Uh oh, Barry! You used common sense and logic in your thinking. That is so toxic to the liberal that you could be charged with a crime! It doesn’t support their distorted reality agenda that they are trying to sell. Keep it up! Independent thinking is sorely needed in this nation.
YuCallJoe,
Thanks, but it was mostly meant to be satire and funny ! I just wanted to point out that there is an environmental impact to just about everything. I knew that a few liberals on here would get all bent our of shape, since they seem not to have a sense of humor. Still looking for that goat !
Wow Barry you sound like someone who definitely knows what socialism is and isn’t planning on collecting any medicare or social security right?
Such genius ideas. I’m sure your the first person in the whole world to crunch the numbers and figure out that we should probably just burn oil forever because it magically refills. I mean there probably aren’t a bunch of people who graduated high school and maybe even college and have been researching climate change and figuring out actual solutions for people whose only education comes from facebook and fox to debunk. crazy talk right
Barry Me
Relax, it was meant to be satire and funny !!! As for SS and Medicare, you pay into that all your life. And then, when you retire, you still pay more for medicare. Some of you people just can’t take a joke !
WAT TGI, nobody commented on Marcia or Barry’s LTE? mEh. What a bunch of circus clowns like King Ige and all the corporate counties and their corrupt politicians!
Barry , except for fingerpointing at Greta T you were doing well pointing at the tradeoffs. But your last paragraph went off the rails into conspiracy theory. Next time,stop while you’re ahead instead of erasing your credibility.
Barry, maybe go back to comedian school for the degree?