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Violence in films harms society
One of the victims of the Batman movie shooting in Aurora, Colo., was 6 years old. What possesses a parent and those who make the movie codes to permit children of the most tender, impressionable, innocent age to absorb the ingenious evil spewed out through the technological magic of these Batman films?
I remember seeing a movie at a very tender age — "Bambi." And I know it instilled in me a great love for life and all nature, and a great respect for fire. I saw another Disney gem in "Pinocchio," from which I absorbed a certain curiosity to learn more about this strange allure of the theater.
America and the world must wrestle with a most serious problem that raises questions about basic freedoms, including speech, expression, gun ownership and the role of the arts.
Gratuitous violence is a most vulgar form of pornography, reducing man to the lowest possible denominator.
Tomas Belsky
Hilo
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Beverage fee unwarranted
State Health Director Loretta Fuddy explained that a shortfall in the beverage container recycling program’s operating funds will cause a fee increase by a half cent per bottle ("Beverage container fee to rise a half-cent," Star-Advertiser, July 19). This hurts small convenience stores and single purchase consumers. One day later, the governor and his budget director are on TV boasting about a $306 million surplus in the fiscal year that just closed ("State’s financial picture brightens," Star-Advertiser, July 20).
What a shibai!
Carol Thomas
Kailua
Dignitaries can go a little slower
My heartfelt condolences go out to the family of the solo bike officer who lost his life during a motorcade training excercise.
I understand training is a necessity for all facets of police work. However, is it truly necessary for any visiting dignitary to go through traffic unimpeded without slowing down just a little until traffic can be cleared? I have witnessed this type of training personally and have seen solo bike officers as well as patrol cars driving on surface roads and intersections at a very high rate of speed that leaves no margin for error. How important can one person be to risk the lives of one of our finest men or women in blue? No one is worth that, in my opinion.
We need to rethink our policies and procedures for this type of service to our visiting dignitaries so it can be conducted in a safer manner to protect the public as well as our finest in blue.
Keith Luke
Kaneohe
NCAA should let Graham play
So the National Collegiate Athletic Association is saying current or incoming football players at Penn State are free to immediately transfer and compete at another school, as one of the conditions set forth with a $60 million fine and other penalties levied for the cover-up of Jerry Sandusky’s alleged atrocities. You can’t penalize the players for something they had nothing to do with.
How then does the NCAA square that with forcing Taylor Graham to sit out a year at the University of Hawaii? How did Graham have anything to do with what happened to Jim Tressel at OSU?
Pete Gonsalves
Kaneohe
Find the positive in candidates
Much has been made of Hawaii’s low voter turnout. Instead of asking how can we increase the turnout, we need to ask why voters aren’t showing up at the polls. I think the main reason is negative advertising. The negative anti-Cayetano ads from Pacific Resource Partnership, combined with the negative anti-rail ads from former Gov. Ben Cayetano, serve only to suppress the vote. People aren’t motivated to vote against someone or something. They get excited voting for someone whose dream is their dream.
Let’s examine the candidates in every race and determine the positive things they stand for. Let that positive energy motivate you to vote in the upcoming primary election. Because the outcome of your dream can be a good one, if you vote.
Roy Kamisato
Niu Valley
Political ads are too negative
The upcoming primary election on Aug. 11 will have many political impacts. At stake are the political clout of labor unions and the impact of rich campaign funds and negative campaigning.
As the election draws nearer, the news media are flooded with expensive campaign ads. Some of these ads are filthy with the intent of tainting the images of particular candidates, even to the extent of digging out past election campaigns.
The Honolulu mayoral race is so important. The three major mayoral candidates are smart, hardworking and with impeccable integrity. Please vote wisely and independently.
Constante A. Domingo
Moanalua
Bain’s capitalism isn’t productive
Harold Loomis says that Bain Capital and Mitt Romney were just doing what that type of company does, and that this is capitalism at its best ("Bain Capital did nothing wrong," Star-Advertiser, Letters, July 18).
I can agree that these practices are legitimate in the strict sense of law. However, are these practices becoming of someone who would lead us? Many middle-class citizens’ lives were detrimentally affected by Bain’s actions.
The manipulation of money, without making products, has become predatory and a grotesque replacement of what once was a great heritage.
Since this type of capitalism is what is now prevalent in the market, it should be taxed at 30 percent, like product-creating businesses. Demand comes from a broad base of middle-income workers. What creates jobs is demand, not an abundance of purchasing power in the hands of 2 percent of the population.
Richard K. Godoy
Sunset Beach
HART finds way to add features
Because listening to taxpayers and responding to their concerns is an important part of my job, I want to address the topics of train car seats, fare gates and change orders raised in Bob Vokwein’s letter ("Change orders might not end," Star-Advertiser, Letters, July 18).
The funds for adding train seats and fare gates will come from the savings we recently realized through budget cuts elsewhere in the project. We are eliminating unnecessary costs in every part of HART’s operations.
Change orders cannot be foreseen but are expected on every large project. We have budgeted for them through a contingency fund that currently has a balance of more than $600 million, higher than the Federal Transit Administration requires at this stage of the project.
We will continue to exercise stringent fiscal oversight to ensure the rail project’s costs stay within budget or continues to decrease, as our latest financial plan shows.
Dan Grabauskas
Executive director and chief executive officer, Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation