• Last weekend I met Davids and I met Goliaths • We don’t need another war • Stand up Kaua‘i Last weekend I met Davids and I met Goliaths. The Goliaths are mean mangrove trees, thickets, really, alien and invasive
• Last weekend I met Davids and I met Goliaths • We don’t need another war • Stand up Kaua‘i
Last weekend I met Davids and I met Goliaths.
The Goliaths are mean mangrove trees, thickets, really, alien and invasive in Hawaii, that aggressively supplant all else leaving no room for a healthy diverse flora; and of particular harm to native Hawaiian plants. For more than 30 years, water-loving mangroves have been advancing their stranglehold on the Hule‘ia River and the bay by the Nawiliwili small boat harbor.
But these Goliaths have met their Davids: the volunteers of Malama Hule‘ia, a community of strong, caring citizens from 7 to 70 who are organizing around caretaking the river valley and the bay.
OMG. If you want to be inspired, stop in at the next mangrove madness cleanup and watch commitment in action. This group may be the only living creature tougher than mangrove. Their work cutting, dragging, and chipping mangrove trees, to eradicate the pest from Niumalu, is not for the faint of heart, and I mean that both physically and emotionally. Somehow happy, these intrepid ordinary people are going at the heart of darkness and sweating buckets all for the satisfaction of helping to clean up the neighborhood.
Sponsored by Kaiola Canoe Club, whose clubhouse at the mouth of the Hule`ia puts them in the center of mangroveville, this pilot project to remove the patch of invasives from the stretch in front of the County’s Niumalu Beach Park is the proving grounds for technique and all ideas for efficient removal and effective maintenance are welcome — from any volunteer who comes to work. From this project the group will learn how to Free Hule‘ia: what needs to be done and the best ways to do it.
A grant from the Hawai‘i Community Foundation has helped to purchase safety and mangrove-destruction equipment; and the number of community partners is growing. Besides organizing work sessions, the group is educating the public about the threat that mangrove poses to the native Hawaiian environment, and encouraging people to pull mangrove seedlings or destroy the seeds to stop them before they start.
For the price of your sweat equity, beside the splendor of Ha`upu Mountain, you too can be inspired by this community brave enough to go up against a giant. Check in at www.malamahuleia.org or watch the community calendars for the next mangrove madness work day.
Carolyn Larson
Lihu‘e
We don’t need another war
Drones are unmanned aerial vehicles, or flying robots, that have rapidly advanced in their technology and uses. President Obama has deployed them for surveillance and missile strikes in countries the U.S. is not in a war with.
It’s a clandestine war-from-afar strategy whereby “pilots” at New Jersey and Nevada military bases use joysticks to fire missiles at unsuspecting targets who are too often innocent bystanders.
It is accepted by the American public that is not yet ready for another land war. After eight years, the President finally acknowledged in January 2012 that these extra-judicial attacks by the CIA were occuring. And not until mid-April did a Congressional committee debate the propriety of this radical change in the conduct of war.
Drones also are going to become ubiquitous to Americans through the rest of the decade because the Federal Aviation Administration has begun taking applications from public and private entities to own and deploy their own surveillance drone.
About half are police and sheriff departments. If the drone manufacturing lobby gets its way, upwards of 30,000 flying cameras will be in American skies by 2020.
The local angle is that if any state or county agency, the DLNR or Kaua‘i Police Department, gets the idea to acquire and deploy a surveillance drone, the community must weigh in beforehand to judge how this technology with its potential for abuse might conflict with First Amendment privacy rights. Ben Franklin said those who would sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither and will lose both.
Kip Goodwin
Kapa‘a
Stand up Kaua‘i
Dear Howard, you are certainly correct about the former discussion site. Trust me on this one: I was one of the most reviled, lied about, verbally battered and abused contributors to that site. I was threatened. I was stalked. But I stuck, Howard. One must always stand up to bullies.
I suggest that the new editor, Bill Buley, whose work I admire, open the discussion site but set it up as the Forum is set up: contributors must sign in and sign their posts using their real names and no stupid, childish and silly icons. It would just be another dimension to the paper. As is the Garden Island net home page. The more dimensions the merrier.
Has anyone noticed? The pictures on the net are much better than the pictures in the paper?
Thank you Garden Island guys. Stay healthy, wealthy and well.
Please make this a happening. TGI is the soul of Kaua‘i. The Forum is the heart. The discussion site the voice.
Peace and love.
Bettejo Dux
Kalaheo
