Research is worthy cost

Regarding Jay Ambrose’s column "Obama’s stimulus plan great for cocaine-using monkeys" (Star-Advertiser, Aug. 13). How discouraging. Research is No. 1 on this taxpayer’s list to stimulate the economy.

Our country has the brightest, most talented and creative minds in the world. Imagine if our response to 9/11 had been to invest in alternative energy and create the best and most efficient energy storage solutions in the world.

Tens if not hundreds of thousands of high-paying tech jobs would have been created and our oil dependence on unstable Middle Eastern countries would likely have decreased significantly.

Instead, nine years later, we continue to fund the very regimes that we oppose with our unabated fossil fuel consumption while Obama poses next to the new Jeep Cherokee that gets a whopping 16 city/21 highway mpg. Is this something to be proud of? I’m horrified.

It’s obvious that the next economic boom is in alternative energy. It’s certainly within reason to believe that gas will eventually be $10 a gallon. What then?

Don’t go with rail yet

Keep the expensive rail system on the back burner and take the money and build an elevated highway from West Loch to the Hickam-Airport area, paralleling the bike path from Waipahu to the stadium and beyond. This could take care of the Ewa Beach and Waipahu traffic. Use some of the north flats of Pearl Harbor; this area is not being used by the military as the water is too shallow for navigation. The highway could branch off to Sand Island and help the Matson and Young brothers traffic from the west. This would also give more time to find a cheaper and more useful rail system.

JetBlue worker wrong

I certainly get the message from Leonard Pitts’ column, but JetBlue flight attendant Steven Slater was in the wrong ("Most Americans think most Americans are becoming ruder, and they’re right," Star-Advertiser, Aug. 19).

I was a restaurant manager in a busy, upscale area of town. The place was full of wealthy customers, who barked orders at my staff constantly. Complaints include: "This toast is buttered on the wrong side," "I said a three-minute egg, not a four-," and "I know it’s not on the menu, but will you ask the cook?"

I was a good manager, and have had my fair share of standing up for my staff with demanding, nasty customers, but if one of my staff walked out in the middle of a busy shift, keep on walking, baby. You’re fired.

When you walk off a job like that, you put more burden on your co-workers. It makes the restaurant look bad in the eyes of the customer. It shows the manager that you can’t handle the stress. If my wait staff can’t handle the stress on land, I sure wouldn’t want them working for me in the air.

Stop war on cannabis

Our counties are in disarray, and our state, which knows that cannabis is a medicine, is continuing to waste money on a war with a plant that has many proven medical benefits.

People are dying on our substandard roads, murders are going unsolved, ice and meth use has increased directly because of Green Harvest, yet our esteemed leaders continue this terrorizing of the citizens with war tactics.

I call on all campaigning politicians to really think about the truth of this matter. You all know that cannabis is a plant that makes people happy. It does not make them insane killers. It is a cure-all, food, fiber, fuel, medicine.

Why are you letting the pharmaceutical companies dictate your policy? Why do you not stand up to the federal government and tell them to go home? Why do we, the little people, have to do the work for you?