November 9, 2010 News Read > Hawaii Free Press

Hawaii Daily News Read

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

November 9, 2010 News Read
By Andrew Walden @ 2:45 PM :: 8844 Views

East-West Center hammered for “sustained, biased and politically-motivated attack on World War II veterans”

Democrat Borreca, Willes Lee team up in effort to split faith-based voters off of GOP

Party activist Eric Ryan launched a nasty-gram last week, demanding that all party leaders be dismissed. But former GOP Chairman Lee has come out with a more temperate review of the race. He also was harsh.

(And Democrat Borreca wishes he could endorse this, but he needs a more refined version of Eric Ryan—Willes Lee.)

"This crew lost the gov race, (congressional district) HI-1, a Senate seat, had trouble connecting with donors and failed to GOTV (get out the vote)," Lee wrote. (No. Hawaii GOP base GOTV was as effective a ever, what was missing is the support of independents.)

Part of the reason for the loss, according to Lee, was a tactical mistake by the GOP. "(Lt. Gov. James "Duke") Aiona and the RGA (Republican Governors Association) never defined Abercrombie. Conversely, Abercrombie and (GOP Chairman Jonah) Kaauwai's letter to pastors defined Aiona," Lee wrote.

(No. The Abercrombie-lovin media defined Aiona—mostly as someone who was responsible for the imagined failures of the Lingle administration—ie furloughs. Most of the shouting about Transformation Hawaii came from a tiny clique of gay atheist activists around UH Manoa, and the Oahu Dem Org. This election was about the economy.)

"The religious right is a valuable coalition with R's, but Kaauwai put it in charge of our message," Lee said.

(WRONG. The message from the Aiona and Djou campaigns was all about the economy. There was almost nothing from either campaign or from the State Party about hot button social issues like gay civil unions.)

Low budget version of Borreca-Lee show : Hawaii Progressives thrilled by GOP gadfly Eric Ryan

REALITY: Church-based voter drive brings 15,000 to polls, powers GOP House gains

MORE REALITY: Hawaii Republican Assembly: Home to Hawaii’s moderate Republicans?

Shapiro: The road doesn’t get easier for the Hawai‘i GOP

The only potential Republican candidates with any heft are Lingle and the three who lost the big races this year — James “Duke” Aiona, Lynn Finnegan and Charles Djou.

Lingle will almost certainly run for U.S. Sen. Daniel Akaka’s seat in 2012 with heavy support from the national GOP as it fights to take control of the Senate, but there’s no clear way back in for Aiona, Finnegan and Djou if they have interest in trying again.

(Yes there is. Possibilities include: Lingle Senate 2012, Djou or Finnegan Congress CD1 2012, Aiona or Finnegan Congress CD2 2012. Finnegan State Senate or Hon council.)

The barriers are philosophical as much as practical; the GOP is unlikely to gain ground unless the local party settles sharp internal divisions over whether it should turn more moderate or conservative, and how cozy the party should get with religious groups.

(Nonsense. The divisions in the GOP are not that great. The whiners like Willes Lee and Eric Ryan are exactly the same people who opposed Jonah Kaauwai last time and lost overwhelmingly. These same people will lose by an even greater margin in 2011 convention vote for Party Chair.)

REALITY: Church-based voter drive brings 15,000 to polls, powers GOP House gains

MORE REALITY: Hawaii Republican Assembly: Home to Hawaii’s moderate Republicans?

Special election set to fill Apo's city council seat

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) - A special election to fill Todd Apo's Honolulu City Council Leeward-Ewa district seat is set for Dec. 29.

The special election will be held by an all-mail ballot. The deadline to file nomination papers is Nov. 19.

Honolulu Muslim Terror suspect was 'polite, friendly'

Shehadeh, 21, held in New York without bail, is charged with making false statements in a matter involving international terrorism and hiding his intent to go to Pakistan to join a fighting group such as the Taliban in 2008. The complaint also alleges Shehadeh attempted to recruit another person to join him….

Kobayashi said as far as residents could tell, Shehadeh lived by himself in a house at 3363 Huelani Drive.

Residents said they wondered who was paying his bills, since he said he was a student and the house rent was probably close to $3,000 a month….

Merritt said he later saw Shehadeh with a man in his 50s or 60s, with a beard, who wore traditional mid-Eastern clothes.

"I asked him, who was the old guy?" Merritt said. "He said, 'Oh, that's my pa.'"

DOE wants to close two schools in Kalihi

By closing two elementary schools in Kalihi, the DOE estimates it could save about $1.5M.

Pu'uhale Elementary School opened in 1929. Former Hawaii Governor Ben Cayetano attended this school, so did former Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hannemann.

Pu'uhale is one of the schools the Department of Education is considering shutting down….

DOE officials are also considering closing Kalihi Elementary School and transferring its students to Kalihi Uka and Ka'ewai in order to save approximately $953,000.

Here’s what they WILL NOT be shutting down: Hawaii DoE: Cost of waste, fraud, and corruption between $191M and $431M per year

Charter school heads fired: Kamaile Academy's board says the move was needed to qualify for federal funding

In the 2009-10 school year, 40 percent of Kamaile students in third through eighth and 10th grade tested proficient in reading, and 25 percent tested proficient in math.

That is (barely) up from 36 percent proficient in reading and 24 percent proficient in math in 2007-08.

To meet adequate yearly progress under NCLB last school year, 58 percent of students must have been proficient in reading and 46 percent proficient in math.

Under U.S. Department of Education rules, schools have four options to be eligible for federal School Improvement Grant dollars: replace the principal and half of its staff; replace its administrators; convert to a charter school (not an option here); or close the school and enroll the students in a higher-performing school.

(Accountability in action.)

Carlisle Supports Tanoue As Head Of DPP

Only a few weeks after winning a special election Honolulu Mayor Peter Carlisle is being criticized for attempting to keep a member of Mufi Hannemann's administration as part of his cabinet.

Opposition to Department of Planning and Permitting Acting Director David Tanoue is coming from North Shore, Oahu residents who are still upset the Envision Laie project is now part of the city's draft sustainable communities plan for Koolauloa.

Tax Hike Pending in Honolulu City Council for Hawaii Historic Properties

Poor Kirk Caldwell might have to pay the same taxes as the peasants.

Maile named administrative director of the courts

Chief Justice Mark E. Recktenwald is pleased to announce the selection of Rodney A. Maile as the new Administrative Director of the Courts effective Dec. 1, 2010.

The Administrative Director assists the Chief Justice in the administration of the Judiciary, including budgeting, planning, and personnel matters.

Local 5 and Kaiser Permanente reach contract agreement

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) - UNITE HERE Local 5 announced Monday that it has reached a tentative agreement on a new contract with Kaiser Permanente Hawaii….

The contract includes stronger sub-contracting language, the creation of labor and management committee to resolve problems within departments and maintains current health care benefits and free retiree medical.

Convicted Illinois Killer Coming To Hawaii to live with UH Perfesser

Boulay has been in prison in Illinois since he strangled his ex-girlfriend to death with a phone cord 12 and a half years ago. His imminent release from prison -- and transfer to Hawaii to live with his wife has the victim's friends and family fuming.

Andrea Will was a freshman at Eastern Illinois University in 1998. Her family said she was trying to stay away from Boulay, her ex-boyfriend, when he called and offered a birthday present at his apartment.

Will’s mother, Patricia Rosenberg, said there was no present and the killing was personal and slow. Rosenberg said she was shown the coroner’s report. “It took four-and-a-half minutes for him to strangle the life out of her,” Rosenberg said.

At trial, the judge rejected Boulay's plea of temporary insanity and gave him a sentence of 24 years, which prosecutors and Will’s mother said was short for first-degree murder.

Rosenberg said at the time the law in Illinois made parole for good behavior almost automatic after half the sentence had been served….

During his prison term, Boulay married a woman who is now an Oahu resident. She is now an assistant professor at the John A. Burns School of Medicine at the University of Hawaii. Rosenberg said Boulay and his (new) wife knew each other in Illinois and the woman provided testimony on is behalf as a character witness at his trial.

(Please take a moment to reflect on the wondrous intellect of the enlightened, conscious, and progressive elites.)

In Korea, Inouye, Illinois Republican thinking about Free Trade

Roskam is in Korea this week to help shepherd the long-stalled U.S. South Korea Free Trade Agreement to completion. The contract — also the focus of a bipartisan working group Roskam helped to launch in June — is expected to benefit from momentum from the Group of 20 summit that begins in Seoul on Thursday.

"There is great political momentum in both the U.S. and Korea right now," Roskam said in a recent statement. "It is creating a moment of opportunity to finalize remaining issues and adopt an FTA that will boost both our nation’s economies for years to come."

"If a mutual agreement is not reached before the start of the G-20 summit," he added, "I am afraid the trade accord may languish indefinitely."

Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) is also in Korea this week. He tweeted yesterday that he's in Seoul meeting with "@DeptofDefense and @StateDept personnel and Korean officials."

EW Center Ripping the USA: Revising History Dismally

Academicians take a whack at the Greatest Generation of Americans in a display of woeful ignorance laced with cheap, revisionist slants at World War II history. Now is the time to scream to high heaven about this travesty spawned by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH).

It happened in July. A group of 25 selected professor historians met in Hawaii at a workshop sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). They were to present and hear scholarly papers on the history of these United States in World War II. It was to be a high-level intellectual rendering of that war receding now into history.

It turned out to be a largely left-liberal diatribe. It was partisan as hell and, worst, an awkward attempt to rewrite history to make America out to be the world's worst villain and all-around Bad Guy. Some speaker/presenters, presumably sticklers for historical accuracy, even made the USA the moral equivalent of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.