May 29, 2004 - Saturday

I couldn't believe the news yesterday morning that computer luggage maker Tom Bihn has been including a secret message in each bag. So I ran over to the Tom Bihn case that protects my Powerbook and looked inside for the label. Sure enough, there it is!! I don't have a photo, but here's the official Bihn version. It's like getting a bonus inside an incredibly good computer case.

Okay, I'm a news junkie. So how is it that I've been missing Don Asmussen's Bad Reporter cartoon in the San Francisco Chronicle?

Make good use of your three day weekend!

May 28, 2004 - Friday

Honolulu Advertiser writer Andrew Gomes has the back story on the announcement of a major new Nordstrom's store at Ala Moana. It's rich with business detail behind one of the headlines of the week. Good work.

The Guardian marks the D-Day anniversary with a collection of personal letters written at the time by soldiers and sailors on both sides. They make for a very interesting read.

Can you pass Mark A. R. Kleiman's Chalabi Quiz? There's nothing like a little quiz to get your brain moving.

I'm trying to catch up with this month's photos, which led to updates on both cat and dog fronts yesterday afternoon. Just click on Ms. Girlie or Ms. Kili for the latest. The month's best sunrise photos should follow over the weekend.

Girlie

Kili

Tomorrow's entry could be late, based on our morning schedule...fair warning.

May 27, 2004 - Thursday

Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (better known as FAIR), has released an analysis of National Public Radio's news sources, and finds an over-reliance on Republicans and government officials. To a certain extent, NPR's ombudsman agrees with the assessment that there's been a shift to the right that should be corrected.

The Daily Mis-Lead yesterday highlighted the Timken factory in Canton, Ohio, once touted by President Bush as a symbol of economic success and now slated for closing.

On Tuesday, the group MoveOn.org asked its supporters for their views on the situation in Iraq and whether the U.S. should set a date for withdrawing military forces. But today the Los Angeles Times reports that a coalition of groups, including MoveOn.org, has already endorsed a position backing a firm date for getting out. So was Tuesday's request for feedback just window-dressing for a position already privately agreed to by MoveOn.org's leadership?

MoveOn.org also provided a venue for yesterday's fired-up speech against the Bush policy in Iraq by Al Gore, a long address which is well worth reading for its details as well as its overall theme.

It's gray and drizzling in Kaaawa, but not wet enough to keep us indoors, so we're heading off on our morning walk.

May 26, 2004 - Wednesday

The Campaign Finance Institute, an affiliate of George Washington University, has issued a brief analysis of spending in the presidential campaign based on the latest filings with the Federal Election Commission on May 20th. Despite substantial increases in donations from individual small contributors, both campaigns still rely heavily on the big money donors.

There's a painful appropriateness in President Bush's announcement this week of a new memorial to the American occupation of Iraq to be built in Baghdad : A brand new maximum security prison. What a legacy we leave, and I don't think he ever reflected on the irony of that one. ""Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free," and then lock 'em up in our American-donated high-tech prison, sometimes without trials or with terms without end. And under our newly reformed rules, no more hoods, just black goggles. Democracy in action. Bravo, Bush.

Hawaiian Electric is in the process of transforming this part of the windward coast by installing new poles along Kamehameha Highway with several times the diameter of those they are replacing. Here's old and new versions on a corner in the middle of Kaaawa. Not only are they much more visually intrusive, marring the view plane to a greater degree, but they also appear much more dangerous to motorists, who seem to careen off our roads in higher than average numbers.

If I recall at least a bit of physics correctly, those old poles would snap off in a collision and in the process absorb some of the energy. These new behemoths are huge, and it's clear they aren't going down in any normal crash. This would appear to mean that the impact will be much worse on occupants of cars involved in such accidents.

Maybe HECO rightly wants to thin the herd, but I would have at least wanted a bit of public discussion. People in other parts of the world keep asking why, in a place where so much of our economy is dependent on the beauty of our physical surroundings, we continue to debase those same public assets with this mass of wires instead of putting them underground.

Good news and bad news. The good news is that yesterday afternoon I experimented with rewashing one of my old negatives, and at least in this test I was able to remove whatever it is that created the appearance of cracking or crazing in a substantial number of my recently "discovered" archives, like the most recent Kahoolawe trial photos from 1976. My new working theory is that the old negative sleeves I stored them in were simply disintegrating and depositing a layer of something on the negatives which even under a magnifier appear to be part of the negatives but, it now seems, can be washed off. The bad news is that it is going to be tedious to carefully wash and dry all of these short strips of negatives.

And so it goes.

May 25, 2004 - Tuesday

The story keeps getting worse. Now Editor & Publisher has disclosed details of abuse suffered by three Reuters staffers picked up by U.S. soldiers early this year, based on transcripts of their statements following release from custody.

And E&P further reports Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt told Reuters officials the agency would be smeared with accusations of "anti-coalition activity" if they pursued complaints about the abuse. Reuters was even told the three could be rearrested for further interrogation if the agency's complaints continued.

And Gov. Lingle told the Jerusalem Post that American Jews are shifting politically to the right and increasingly supporting President Bush because of his support for Israel, a shift which Lingle says could hand Bush a slim victory at the polls in November.

Finally, I noticed several days ago that the domain ilind.com had become available, so quickly scooped it up. Now you can reach this page via either ilind.net or ilind.com.

May 24, 2004 - Monday

The legal battle over the future of Seattle's joint operating agreement between the Times and the Post-Intelligencer continues before the state's Supreme Court, with the eventual outcome still in doubt. For stories from earlier this year, check the Pacific Northwest Newspaper Guild web site, which unfortunately hasn't been updated since late last month.

An internal memo from Gannett's Nashville Tennessean describing the principles behind story selection for the front page under the "real life, real news" initiative somehow made its way over to the weekly Nashville Scene (hit this link, then scroll to the bottom part of the column). Interesting reading.

Another bit of history from my old photos is now available, these dating from Walter Ritte's April 1976 trial on federal trespass charges for his repeat trips to Kahoolawe. It was the first trial of a Kahoolawe defendant. These negatives are in bad shape, but I've posted the photos "as is" before experimenting with more aggressive rescue efforts.

Click for more

May 23, 2004 - Sunday

It's Sunday, so appropriate to share this photo of my cousin, Rev. Canon Thomas Charles Osborne Montgomery, at a protest against the war in Iraq that drew some 80,000 in Glasgow, Scotland last year. He's the fellow in black with the clerical collar. Well, he's actually a second cousin, according to my sister, who is the keeper of such knowledge. Montgomery is rector of St. Margaret's Scottish Episcopal Church in Glasgow.

Click for larger photo

She explains: "His father was Daddy's Cousin Charlie Montgomery, and his grandfather was Grandmother Lind's brother Tom Montgomery, the potato merchant."

She added: "Nice to see some other members of the extended family as peace activists." So it is.

The Kaaawa real estate boom is hitting close to home. After the house two doors down sold for an astronomical price, our immediate neighbor is now rushing to put his house on the market and intends to take the money and move to the mainland. This is all going to send our property taxes through the roof. So those that leave take the money and those who stay pay the bills.

Jeff Garland wonders about the mystery local investors, led by Walter Dods, who have joined in the Carlyle Group's bid to take over Verizon Hawaii? Who are these guys? Good question, isn't it?

Previous week • Other