On Saturday, I cast my 63rd consecutive vote in a governmental election. My first was just after I turned 21 during the first term of President Dwight Eisenhower.

I’ve looked forward to meeting my neighbors at the polling place for an important community activity, participating in a valuable function of our representative form of government.

Today it was different. There were a dozen poll workers there, but only one other voter. There was less sense of community, of sharing something exciting and the mutual responsibility of participating in this critical activity.

Many had voted by mail, and perhaps with the implicit cheapening of the voting process, many just skipped it. Yes, intellectually they knew voting was important, but with no precise time to do it, and no expectation of reinforcement from the neighborhood gathering, intuitively it was less critical. Perhaps it just got put aside.

I remember the day when absentee voting was just for real absentees, not just an opportunity to vote without much effort; when voting was an opportunity to share with neighbors our mutual responsibility to our democracy.

John M. Flanigan

Kaneohe

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Erroneous mail-in ballots won’t count

While serving as a precinct officer during the recent primary election, I observed the ballot scanner identifying different errors — missing political party, multiple votes for the same office, improperly marked choices, voting in more than one party, and more. The scanner rejected erroneous ballots, and voters could correct their mistakes.

It’s likely those ballots, had they been mailed in, would have been voided and discarded. Those votes would not have been tabulated, and the voters would not have known. While this problem is greater for our type of primary elections, having polling locations allows the voters who choose to go to the polls even for the general election to have that added layer of protection from inadvertent errors.

There are other reasons for polling places, and many people even prefer to vote in person. We should not mandate mail-in balloting.

John Kim

Manoa

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PACs motivated by greed, self-interest

The anonymous, nearly unlimited spending on political advertising by political action committee (PAC) “hit squads” helping U.S. Rep. Colleen Hanabusa — Be Change Now and Defend Hawaii Now — are gutless and selfish.

Their mudslinging, cheap-shot smear campaigns are childish and disgusting, despite the so-called “leaders” of Be Change Now outing themselves in a commentary last week (“‘Be Change Now’ is working to fill Hawaii’s leadership void,” Star-Advertiser, Island Voices, Aug. 7) — a transparently lame attempt to save face after nearly universal public condemnation of their reptilian politics.

No one is fooled by these wannabe leaders who think they provide the so-called leadership Hawaii lacks.

Everyone I know sees the PACs for what they are: self-serving wealthy special-interest groups willing to do whatever it takes to perpetuate their power and privileges, which, for far too long now, they bought and paid for by replacing “one person, one vote” with their self-serving plutocratic “one dollar, one vote” faux democracy.

Thomas Brandt

Downtown Honolulu

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‘Law-abiding citizens’ can kill

Someday I hope to meet a “law-abiding citizen.” As far as I know, the Las Vegas mass killer may have been one, until he was allowed to buy weapons of mass destruction because some people, supported by the National Rifle Association, feel it necessary to our freedom and to keep our government in check.

A letter writer said there is no reason to distrust law-abiding citizens with arms beyond their homes (“Trust law-abiding citizens with guns,” Star-Advertiser, Letters, Aug. 11). Nothing could be further from the truth.

People get enraged, they get drunk, they get drugged, they get careless, they panic, they over- react and make mistakes.

Abraham Lincoln said that if you want to test a man’s character, give him power. Having the power of a gun can change many people for the dangerous worse.

Former Maui Mayor Hannibal Tavares, who had also been chief of police, once said that until you give someone a gun, you do not know who they are.

Do we want to give a lot of guns to people and find out who they really are?

Jim Killett

Lahaina

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There’s no such thing as ‘equal work’

Some of the political ads on TV say things like, “equal pay for equal work.”

I have been working for more than 60 years and I can say there is no such thing as equal work.

Giving workers a title and job description does not mean they will work equally. There is always someone in a group who will do more than is required. And there’s always someone in a group who will do just enough to get by.

So although it might sound good, “equal work” is a fantasy.

Otto Cleveland

Pearl City

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Don’t redevelop Ala Moana Park

I am in complete agreement with the commentary on protecting the People’s Park, Ala Moana Beach Park (“Give input on Ala Moana park plans,” Star-Advertiser, Island Voices, Aug. 12).

The park is one of the last refuges from over-development and catering to the rich in our land of aloha. The people have to stand up and fight back. Otherwise, places with meaning and memories like Ala Moana Beach Park will be no more, and will be transformed into something unrecognizable. No more!

Diane Fujimura

Makiki