Cruz’s flat-tax plan would hurt the poor

It’s a given that no one likes to pay taxes.But Jacob Sullum’s column extolling the virtues of a flat income tax as proposed by presidential candidate U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, fails to acknowledge that a flat tax is the most regressive form of taxation ("Cruz’s tax-reform proposals better than current system," Star-Advertiser, March 28).

People with lower incomes will end up paying a significantly larger percentage of their income than people in the highest income brackets.

With all of its bewildering complexity, the current tax tries valiantly to be a progressive tax.It doesn’t succeed because lobbyists have been able to tweak it from time to timeto satisfy the desires of their clients. But to discard it entirely in order to achieve the seductive prospect of filing taxes on a postcard would be a serious error and grossly unfair to people in the lower income brackets.

Ed Sullam
Aina Haina

Taiwanese suffered under Japan rule

Under the colonial rule of Japan, in addition to several million Koreans, many Taiwanese also were conscripted to work for Japan’s war causes ("Koreans also were detained at the Honouliuli POW camp," Star-Advertiser, Island Voices, March 25).

During the February 1941 to September 1945 Japanese occupation of Singapore, Chinese (Hokkien-speaking) parents in Singapore used to urge their children to watch out for Taiwanese serving in the Japanese Imperial Army since they understood every swear word uttered in Hokkien.

Taiwanese is actually Hokkien, a dialect of Xiamen, formerly known as Amoy to the British.

In the past, many Hokkien-speaking Chinese from Xiamen crossed the 110-mile-wide Taiwan Strait to settle in Taiwan.

Choo Lak Yeow
Nuuanu

As a boy, Kuhio was ‘Prince Cupid’

There is another popular notion for the origins of "Prince Cupid" as cited by Pat Omandam in the Honolulu Star-Bulletin in 1999 ("As delegate, ‘Prince Cupid’ won hearts in Congress," Star-Advertiser, Rearview Mirror, March 27).

Jonah Kuhio was named such as a young boy while attending St. Alban’s College, now ‘Iolani School.In the 1870s, a French school teacher, Pierre Jones, commented on how the young boy’s eyes twinkled and he kept a smile: "He is so cute, just like the pictures of the little cupid."

This example of popularmyth-making is not as damaging as to what people today consider HM Queen Lili‘uokalani’s royal standard of color to be lavender or purple, when it was actually yellow. References to that fact are in newspaper articles published during her funeral.

Furthermore, after a brief service at Kawaiaha‘o Church, Kuhio’s casket was taken for viewing at the throne room of ‘Iolani Palace before the cortege marched to the Mausoleum.

The Rev. Dr. Malcolm Naea Chun
Waialae Nui

HECO made bogus excuses against PV

Hawaiian Electric Co. kept down solar electric power in Hawaii with bogus reasons for denying residential solar systems in order to keep their profits up.

Just how bogus we are finding out just now as HECO belatedly is granting those same permits.

HECO President Alan Oshima says: "We were reacting to technology. We’ve learned. We have to be at the forefront of technology."

That’s as close to an admission of guilt as we’re going to get.

I don’t see NextEra making any concrete promises and timetables to help the progress of residential solar energy, even though that is currently the only way to make Hawaii energy self-sufficient. The $11.6 million coming to Hawaiian Electric Industries President Constance Lau when the merger is completed sounds like a payoff.

NextEra, being a much more powerful company than HECO, will have even more power to abuse.

Don’t allow this merger.

David Henna
McCully

$11.6 million make Lau’s views suspect

Hawaiian Electric Industries President Constance Lau said NextEra Energy’s potential purchase of HEI will "help advance" Hawaii’s clean energy goals ("HEI CEO touts NextEra’s goals," Star-Advertiser March 27).

Really? Since when did Lau become so interested in promoting clean energy? Not to imply that Lau is being disingenuous, but it seems fairly obvious that she will say just about anything to promote this deal that will "help advance" her personal enrichment by $11.6 million. End of story.

John Kitchen
Kona

HECO keeps profits from rooftop PV

Kudos for the Froma Harrop column, "Utilities can’t win their war against rooftop solar panels" (Star-Advertiser, March 28), which pointed out electric companies and fossil fuel interests, like the Koch brothers, are fighting for extra fees for rooftop solar to make them less competitive with fossil fuels.

Locally, our parallel is that Hawaiian Electric Co. now wants to cut the rooftop PV credit by more than half, while not mentioning their PV windfall to the public and the Public Utilities Commission.

For example, many PV owners generate more than they use. Last year I generated more than $700 (2,100 kilowatt-hours) non-refundable excess; enough to power more than three homes for a month, and I am just one person.

HECO gets it for free and then sells it at the full rate. It needs to quantify these facts and make them explicit to the PUC.

Chuck Prentiss
Kailua