Let copter pilots train on Big Isle

I have had the pleasure of meeting a few of the Army National Guard Blackhawk pilots who fly out of Hilo airport and they all have told me the same thing: The Pohakuloa training area, Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa are the ideal locations for training if you are preparing to deploy to Afghanistan. They are all veterans of previous deployments and agree that the terrain is almost identical to Afghanistan.

This area provides training in realistic settings yet still allows them to be close to their families as deployment draws near. Asking these military members to go to the mainland to complete training just before deploying to a war zone is an unfair burden on their families. We are already asking a great sacrifice of those about to be deployed and interrupting their training with bureaucratic red tape is unacceptable.

Give the brigade an individual state permit while it completes its state environmental assessment or accept the federal environ- mental study that they have already completed.

Sam Dunn
Hilo

Calls to diversify are nothing new

Jay Fidell lauds Richard Lim, director of the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism, for saying Hawaii should diversify the economy ("Hawaii leaders should march in Lim’s parade," Star-Advertiser, Think Tech, June 21).

So what else is new?

Economists, business leaders and politicians have been saying that for decades. Not that we haven’t tried.

Remember Tap Pryor and the Kahuku shrimp ponds that were supposed to launch a huge new industry of aquaculture?

Remember the state- subsidized incubator companies that were supposed to launch a Hawaii version of Silicon Valley?

Remember the proposed spaceport at South Point that was supposed to put Hawaii on the space map?

While Hawaii continues to look for "the next big thing," as we must, let’s not neglect the big thing we already have — tourism.

Carl H. Zimmerman
Honolulu

Ignore armchair war hawks

Ross Douthat’s commentary presenting tea party Sen. Marco Rubio’s support for patriotic wars against evil exposes the most pernicious aspect of ultraconservative foreign policy ("America is great, but must it always be at war?" Star-Advertiser, June 21). Conservatives have a corrupt criterion for patriotism — the willingness to risk others’ lives but not their own in pursuit of their principles. With no military service, Rubio resembles Dick Cheney, Rush Limbaugh and the host of Vietnam draft dodgers, always eager to promote wars despite their refusal to serve.

The first thing we should consider about warlike politicians and pundits is their military records. Those who have never served should be rejected as demagogic racketeers exploiting patriotism.

That criterion could save us lives, fortune and other disastrous costs of stupid adventures like Vietnam and Iraq.

Charles W. Griffin
Waikiki

Be careful about ‘natural cures’

Your well-intentioned article on purported health benefits from herbs adds to unscientific and even dangerous lore on natural cures and could lead sick persons to avoid needed medical treatment and suffer unwanted side effects ("Eat, grow, heal," Star-Advertiser, June 27).

The article contains many flat-out unattributed statements about herbal health benefits, such as, "Garlic is good for lowering blood pressure and relieving colds and flu." Perhaps, and perhaps not.

But one documented fact not mentioned about garlic is that it may interact with the medical blood thinner warfarin with bad effect.

How do I know this? The Mayo Clinic told me so, on its website. And this is just one example.

Most readers don’t have or won’t take the time to do such searches. But reporters and their editors should take the time, when presuming to tell people what cures what.

Walter Wright
Kaneohe