Help FAA craft good drone regulations

Your nicely done editorial alerts Hawaii to the onset of federal drone regulations, a recognition that this disruptive robotic technology is here to stay (“New rules for drones appropriate,” Star-Advertiser, Our View, Dec. 26).

Not stated is the crucial need for potential drone users to stand alongside the regulators, together shaping the future, focused on safety with value to the population.

Bryan Silver’s initiatives at Kalani High School are recognized in the same edition for pushing both a solution-seeking STEM approach to set robotics on a foundation of safe engineering and for creative entrepreneurship to convert robotic technology into useful value (“Kalani High robotics coach inspires students,” Star-Advertiser, Dec. 26).

Public-private “Pathfinder” drone programs are evolving with the Federal Aviation Administration to find that nexus of safety and value. CNN leads the development of drone operations for video news coverage. How about the Star-Advertiser leading a similar development for print journalism?

Ted Ralston

Waikiki

Policing drones will be difficult

None of the drone incidents listed in your editorial would have been prevented by registration. None (“New rules for drones appropriate,” Star-Advertiser, Our View, Dec. 26).

Just like gun-registration laws, drone-registration laws are truly unenforceable. If someone takes a drone out of his car, makes a takeoff from a parking lot, flies his craft at 500 feet over an airport and 20 minutes later lands it, how is anyone going to catch him? Unlike driving a car on roads where there are police officers capable of questioning or citing someone who looks too young or drives erratically, there is no “flight police.”

Carl L. Jacobs

Aiea

No grounds to call Mehau ‘godfather’

Larry Mehau was wrongly libeled as the godfather of organized crime in Hawaii (“Well-connected rancher dies,” Star-Advertiser, Dec. 24).

As state attorney general, I looked into the allegation and found no truth to support it and so testified at his libel trial against Rick Reed.

Larry was a friend of government and selflessly gave to those in need. He also was a close friend of my uncle, Henry Walker. The only time I ever saw Larry wearing a tie was at my uncle’s birthday party.

Larry was a good man who will be missed by those who knew him.

Michael A. Lilly

Pacific Heights

Mehau obit left out mention of Marsland

Describing the life of Larry Mehau without mentioning the late Honolulu Prosecutor Charles Marsland Jr. is like describing Moby Dick without mentioning Captain Ahab.

John Stephan

Tantalus

Fireworks blasts are rocking the house

I heard the first major blast in my Kaneohe neighborhood on Thanksgiving night and it’s been like a burgeoning wave since.

Almost every night a few more, a little more intense, and you never know when you’ll be jolted out of your chair or sleep.

The other evening someone set off a blast that literally rattled my lanai door and I saw the flash. Scary.

New Year’s Eve will find me hunkered down at home with my pets and keeping watch in my neighborhood to make sure nothing lands that could catch fire in our condo complex.

Is anyone really serious about keeping illegal fireworks out of our island? I wonder.

Michel Grotstein

Kaneohe

Court bamboozled by TMT protesters

Gov. David Ige, the Hawaii Supreme Court and the state Department of Land and Natural Resources are spineless for permitting the Thirty Meter Telescope protesters to walk all over them.

Desecration and sacredness of Mauna Kea rests in the eyes and minds of the beholders. I hold more reverence and respect for the beaches of Normandy, the sands of Iwo Jima and even Mount Suribachi, where thousands of lives were sacrificed and lost in the name of freedom.

The protesters bamboozled the Hawaii Supreme Court into saying the approval process is no longer valid because it lacked adequate representation. What a bunch of malarkey.

Not to worry. Astronomers, for the good Lord God, will make it all happen. Imua for our Thirty Meter Telescope.

McWarren J. Mehau

Mountain View, Hawaii island

Let’s be nicer to all every day of the year

I loved the commentaries in Thursday’s paper (“All I want for Christmas is …,” Star-Advertiser, Dec. 24).

Carrie Lukas has some great insight — a copy of the U.S. Constitution in every holiday stocking. Whoa! We have forgotten who we are as a nation. Have we taken the time to absorb what those words say and mean?

The Rev. Dr. Lauren R. Stanley wants world peace, and for people to be nicer to each other. She said, “I want the excruciating rudeness and nastiness and boorishness to Just. Stop. Now.” Do we get this?

She also said: “I can be more polite and more affirming. I can give more, and demand less. It is all up to me, and I know that.”

Her words made me sit up and think about what she wrote from her heart. During December we all tend to be more caring in giving and interacting with each other. How about having the December-feeling every single day of the year?

Linda Iverson

Moiliili