Medical pot snafu must get fixed

Thank you for your recent article on the problems with insurance coverage for Hawaii’s dispensaries.

Unfortunately, this is just another example of what happens when a state accepts the medical use of marijuana but fails to address the conflict that such use creates with the federal regulation of this substance.

State medical use is currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States, which means that our state Uniform Controlled Substances Act and the federal Controlled Substances Act are in agreement.

It’s the obsolete federal regulation that still has marijuana listed in Schedule I that is causing these difficulties.

If our Legislature doesn’t get serious about fixing this problem next session, we are only going to see more of the same. Millions of dispensary investor dollars up in smoke, and thousands of legitimate patients left to fend for themselves.

Politics over patients is unacceptable.

Clifton Otto, M.D.

Hawaii Kai

—

Rooting for bikes’ success, helmets

I echo Lee Cataluna’s skepticism about Honolulu residents instantly developing a health consciousness and hopping on Biki bikeshare bikes in droves (“Bikeshare peddling comes with familiar ring,” Star-Advertiser, June 30).

Time will tell who uses it and how much. I would like to see a thoughtfully planned, safe bicycle lane network encompassing our more heavily traveled surface streets. That might move more locals to take up regular biking, but likely using their own bikes, not bikeshares.

Safety is utmost. I’d bike to work if we had a safe bike lane grid in Honolulu. I do think the bikeshare website should promote the use of helmets. Every bike rider should wear one, especially if the bikers are “inexperienced” (Biki’s term).

Anne Wheelock

Nuuanu

—

Don’t tar all at hard-working VA

As a long-time employee of the Department of Veterans Affairs, I challenge the conclusions and question the assumptions made by John Corboy, who stated that the VA has been “rocked by decades of scandals and corruption of astonishing magnitude” (“VA’s failures show single-payer flaws,” Star-Advertiser, Letters, June 30).

This is, of course, totally hyperbolic, and Corboy blindly buys into the Republican Party line.

In fact, the VA is one of the largest entities in the entire federal government, with almost 380,000 employees at hundreds of medical facilities, clinics, benefits offices and cemeteries. The questionable or negligent actions of a few top managers is in no way descriptive of the dedication and “above-and-beyond” efforts of those who care for America’s veterans.

It is so easy to sling falsehoods and use them to attempt to prove the false premise that “the U.S. government … seems absolutely incapable of properly caring for (these veterans).”

So easy, but wrong, in a Trumpian way. Lots of dedicated Americans care.

Michael Mills

Ewa Beach

—

Ala Moana has risky conditions

Ala Moana Center’s owners were cited by the city Department of Planning and Permitting (DPP) in October 2016 for a railing failure that led to the death of one man and the serious injury of another.

At the time, Francis Cofran of Ala Moana said: “The safety and welfare of our customers and employees is a matter we take seriously and always address as a priority” (“Mall’s owners cited over rusted railings,” Star-Advertiser, Oct. 15, 2016).

Acting on a complaint, DPP issued a notice of violation on June 15 for spalling concrete and exposed rebar on the ceiling of an Ala Moana parking garage. When overhead concrete spalls, it can fall on automobiles and pedestrians at any time.

In response to the citation, Cofran said: “The safety and welfare of our customers and employees, as well as customer satisfaction, is of the utmost importance to us and something we will continue to prioritize” (“Ala Moana Center cited for damaged parking lot ceiling,” Star-Advertiser, June 21).

How might I best describe Cofran’s statements: feckless, disingenuous, deceitful?

Leonard Lepine

Kailua

—

Tweets show Trump to be unfit

Tweets broadcast to the world show that President Donald Trump is divisive, with little or no interest in establishing unity; that he thoroughly enjoys disparaging others; that he delights in dispensing fake news; and that he is a parvenu (Trump’s own grandfather was exiled from his native Germany, yet was accepted by U.S. immigration).

But the one absolute that Trump’s tweets make absolutely clear, is that Trump does not learn from his mistakes (despite the best efforts of Trump’s family and Oval Office staff), and that makes Trump a very dangerous man, unfit to be president of the United States of America.

Rico Leffanta

Kakaako