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September 4, 2004 - Saturday

News from the top of South Street: Former Star-Bulletin news editor Steve Petranik, who moved to the Advertiser earlier this year, will be taking over as news editor later this month. Congratulations, Steve!

For some reason, Friday was the day for lots of feedback. Here's a note directly from the Star-Bulletin/MidWeek press room in Kaneohe:

Today you posted "From a friend at the Star Bulletin."

That person's comment about the competition having a better press is very true, however, saying the competition having a better press crew is not correct !

Running a new 'state of the art' press is very easy. Running an aging press takes a real Pressman. As a Pressman working at the Star Bulletin, I took his/her comments as a kick in the groin.

We have some very talented Pressman working at HSB. I personally have been running offset web presses for over 30 years. I take pride in putting out the best product I possibly can & so does my crew.

It is true Press output is only as good as its input.

As you can see, the competitive attitude isn't limited to reporters and editorial staff. And that, I presume, is a good thing for the newspaper business.

There's lots of interesting stuff to be found at PoliticalMoneyLine.com, including an excellent online directory of Washington lobbyists, info on so-called 527 groups, even financial disclosures filed by justices of the U.S.Supreme Court, as well as all the more traditional info on campaign contributions and candidates.

And there's an interesting story in today's Seattle Times on a lawsuit brought by a "psychic" against her former employer, the National Psychic Network. The lawsuit opens up some of the inner workings of this particular exploitation business.

September 3, 2004 - Friday

I was wandering online yesterday and came across an interesting Hawaii link to the big TX, former Texas Congressman and, later, Hawaii federal judge Horace Worth Vaughan. Quite an interesting tale.

From a friend at the Star-Bulletin:

Regarding the Advertiser's new press and color...

If you want to see what the Star-Bulletin's staff is capable of putting together, take a look at tomorrow's QB magazine. It's our version of the UH football guide. Rich Walker did the photography, Mike Rovner did the page design and Dean Sensui did the prepress.

Offset printing, glossy stock, printed on one of Hagadone's presses.

Compare this with what the Advertiser put together.

While the competition has a better press and a better press crew than we do, our paper still makes better use of photographers' talent and generally has better page design. We may be outnumbered and outgunned, but we have them outsmarted for now. Should they ever learn to make better use of their available talent, we'll be in even deeper trouble.

Press output is only as good as its input.

I just brought the S-B inside, and they did do a beautiful job on this football magazine. Rich Walker's portraits are a cut or two above the norm.

September 2, 2004 - Thursday

The concrete was poured at our house in Kaaawa yesterday, and I'm exhausted just from watching the process. Labor intensive with time pressure throughout, and lots of art necessary to finish it off just right. The crew earned every one of the many, many pennies it cost us.
Toby was the first cat to venture out onto the fresh concrete. He didn't immediately race out there. He waited two, maybe three minutes after the last of the crew got into their trucks and pulled out of the driveway. He must have been lurking nearby just waiting for his chance. But it was already too late to leave little paw prints. Whew.

Well, looking at reviews of our newest TV cop show, the preponderance of the evidence is that we've gone from Hawaii 5-0 to Hawaii Stink-O.

Hartford Courant: "...another NBC stinker."

Newsday: "...an immature knockoff"

Philadelphia Inquirer: "A pupu platter of TV crime cliches."

Toronto Globe & Mail: "...they all appear to be engaged in a game of who-can-do-the-best-bad-acting routine."

TVBarn.com: "...a terrible show"

Ouch.

More evidence of management breakdown up in the valley. The University of Hawaii's Manoa Campus is a small city of more than 20,000 people, but its only post office shut down two weeks ago, according to a notice emailed out yesterday. The announcement had previously appeared in the student newspaper and the online faculty-staff newsletter, but that was before classes started and "somehow" a lot of folks apparently missed it, prompting complaints that apparently led to another try at spreading the word.

You can still drop a letter into a mailbox on campus and buy stamps from a machine, but if you've got anything else needing service, forget it.

Students and faculty are directed off-campus for assistance. "The nearest post offices for over-the-counter service are located at 2700 South King Street (turn into the parking lot at University Flowers) and in the Manoa Marketplace."

But they're working feverishly on a fix, right?

Well, maybe not. This is Hawaii. Here's the extremely noncommittal official statement: "Auxiliary Services is looking at options for possible resumption of service at a future date."

It's just another in the ongoing series of management meltdowns that leaves me just shaking my head in amazement, although it obviously pales in relation to the lack of habitable dorm rooms or the unforeseen shortage of classes. But mail service is one of those things like running water and indoor plumbing, a modern convenience we sort of expect to be available.

Oh, need I say that administrators and departments will still be provided postal services "for official university business"?

September 1, 2004 - Wednesday

Ryan Ozawa at HawaiiNews.com reports that several Hawaii residents who traveled to New York to join protests at the Republican convention were swept up in mass arrests yesterday, including a representative of the Quaker-based American Friends Service Committee.

Ryan commneted in an email last night: "We'll see if this story catches the local mainstream media's attention: If not, maybe the press up there with Lingle are a little too embedded, after all. :)"

Rarely do issues of politics and newspapering overlap as much as in the report on the looting of Hollinger International, which assigns special blame at the door of neo-con insider Richard Perle, who is referred to as a "faithless fiduciary". It's worth reading through a few of these stories to get a sense of how this other part of the world works. While newsrooms are squeezed to extract maximum profit, up the food chain it's a remarkably different story.

The Honolulu Advertiser's MidWeek knock-off, Island Weekly, has already scooped up syndicated columnist Michelle Malkin, who was dropped by MW in reaction to her defense of the internment of Japanese Americans.

It's getting harder and harder to tell the Advertiser from the Star-Bulletin, at least at first glance. They are, it appears, slowly morphing into versions of each other. The Advertiser's new printing plant is not blowing away the competition in terms of visual quality, which must be a relief for the folks at Restaurant Row. What will they do next to break out of the box?

Click for larger photo

And now for something completely different. This photo was taken while I was standing on the beach in the morning, but facing the mountains rather than toward the ocean. Some day this bridge is going to collapse, but in the meantime it's been undergoing repairs every few years.

Kaaawa bridge

August 31, 2004 - Tuesday

With any luck, we're pouring concrete at our place tomorrow morning. Won't the cats be surprised by that!

Here's a weird and disturbing story of a guy threatened with arrest for sitting on a bench outside a public library with a laptop accessing the public wireless Internet system. Homeland security and all. Stealing public information from a library. What will Ashcroft & Co. think of next?

Back at UH, according to a report posted by the Manoa Faculty Senate, Acting President David McClain has indicated he intends to eliminate three positions created by Dobelle, including the top public affairs position formerly held by Paul Costello (Vice-President of External Affairs and University Relations), along with the job of Chief of Staff (Sam Callejo would become Vice President for Administration and Finance (the position vacated by Wick Sloane) and VP for International Education (the position created for Joyce Tsunoda when she stepped down as community college czar). This small move alone will yield a total salary savings of about $600,000 per year.

She's holding a sign which reads, "Bring our boys home, End the war". Timely. But it was a Honolulu peace march and rally on April 24, 1971. A day to end war, we said. Unfortunately, here we are 30+ years later and waging the same struggle for peace and sanity. Click on the picture for more. Oh, if you do recognize yourself or a friend, please let me know (email ian@ilind.net).

August has been a busy month here at ilind.net with the both total visits and pages viewed easily exceeding all previous periods. As of this morning, there had been nearly 22,000 visits and over 75,000 pages viewed during the month. This appears to be the result of the core group of regular readers, plus those who stopped by to read about the Dobelle matter or to plow through the photo sets of the 1977 Hawaiian rally as well as the "virtual flashback" to our 1969 wedding. Thanks to all for stopping by.

August 30, 2004 - Monday

Meda's taking off today for the first meeting of a national research project in Washington, D.C., so I'll have to do double duty the rest of the week taking care of the house and cats on my own. Things could get strange.

Former S-B writer Pat Bigold has a piece in the Boston Globe today on Hawaii's new ranking among the "meanest" states in dealing with the homeless.

Michelle Malkin, the conservative columnist whose recent defense of the internment of Japanese during WWII ruffled feathers locally, won't be appearing in MidWeek any longer, according to a note on her blog:

There will be no more Malkin opinions in MidWeek, a Honolulu paper that had been a satisfied client of my syndicated column for several years. In an e-mail to a Midweek reader, the editor, Don Chapman, explained his decision to drop my column as follows: "[I]n light of her new book and guest column in the Star-Bulletin justifying the internment of Japanese-American families in WWII, we felt she had become a detriment to our reputation and to our business." I suppose this sort of thing is to be expected. I hope Chapman did not receive pressure or reprisals, and wish him only the best.

From my friend Marnie Weeks comes this news of the first CD from her new recording company specializing in Hawaiian music:

Kimo Alama Keaulana and Lei Hulu are coming out with a new CD, "Hula Lives!" in September!

Details may be found on the website of Mele Nani Music, Inc., along with images, song clips and even video! We invite you to visit us at ...

I found a great photo of Emil Kruss, mentioned here last week along with the photo of his now-140 year old barometer.

Have you run into this one? The former Speaker of the Texas House of Representatives apologizes for using his influence to get George W. Bush and sons of other influential Texans into the National Guard to avoid Vietnam service. On video. And not a moment too soon.

Finally, a bit of cat energy seems appropriate this morning. Hey, Toby, I said "energy". Well, after all, "cat" and "nap" are almost synonymous. Anyway, just click on Toby's picture for the full batch of new photos.

August 29, 2004 - Sunday

Honolulu Weekly editor Lesa Griffith deserves credit for digging past the Chris Lee propaganda machine and getting at least some hints of what's really going on with the university's new Academy of Creative Media.(that link will work at least until mid-week).

There are tantalizing hints here, like Lee's former executive assistant who says he quit "because he did not want his 'name or reputation associated with ACM under the leadership of Mr. Lee.' "

What does that mean? It's certainly a zinger that begs for follow-up.

The suggestion here yesterday that the legal warnings about BOR minutes may be prompted by matters unrelated to the Dobelle situation could be correct. For example, at the end of the June 2, 2004 executive session, regents approved a $220,000 payment to settle claims of sexual harassment brought against a prominent UH researcher by four women represented by attorney Jim Bickerton. An internal investigation of the allegations initiated by Manoa Chancellor Peter Englert "concluded that the evidence supported a cause determination of hostile environment sexual harassment in violation of the University’s policies", according to the minutes. The university has issued a five-day suspension against the researcher and required him to undergo mandatory training. However, he was granted an extension of time to file an appeal of the decision, so the personnel process may still be considered less than final although the payment has been approved.

These are the kinds of things which, I suppose, could give UH lawyers heartburn.

And Eudora users are still without their email as a result of an unresolved glitch at the UH computer system. It's hard to tell whether the IT gurus are trying to ignore the problem and just hope everyone migrates to other software. I've already had to shift Meda over to Apple Mail so that she can get her work done, although she would prefer to stick with Eudora.

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