On Dec. 1, Hawaii will begin a monthly test of the siren warning of imminent nuclear attack. The elementary school “drop drills” in the 1950s created lasting trauma as we hid under our desks in implied protection from atomic bombs.

Preventing a nuclear war became what I believed to be the safest — the only — option. I still believe this.

The Hawaii Emergency Management Agency minimizes the extent of casualties, radiation sickness and structural damage. This contradicts the information we got during the Cold War when “mutually assured destruction” was the understood result of a nuclear attack.

“Sheltering in place” isn’t likely to keep us safer, but at least it offers an alternative to mass public panic. If the warning is ever real, we should consider how we want to spend our final moments.

Meanwhile, may the Dec. 1 siren serve to motivate everyone to work for peace.

Nancy Aleck

Manoa

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Tour helicopters torment residents

Last week or so I heard a tour helicopter owner talking on NPR about why they shouldn’t have to fly over the ocean to take their customers to see the lava and other natural features. It’s just too expensive for them, and scary to crash in the ocean.

For some reason, helicopter tour companies think they own the skies above us all, and subject us to their noise and the resulting PTSD anger minute by minute, and we are supposed to feel sorry for them. They continue to fly anywhere they want, as low as they want, showing our backyards and front yards to their paying customers.

It doesn’t matter what time in the morning on Thanksgiving or any holiday or day of the week, they fly back and forth, day in and day out, ad nauseum. Why do tour helicopters get to make their own rules and hurt tens of thousands of residents on a daily basis?

Sara Steiner

Pahoa, Hawaii island

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Tax bill could hurt GOP at polls

It is maddening to see how desperate our president and the congressional Republicans are to enact huge tax cuts for corporations and the rich while proposing meager tax cuts for the rest of us.

The middle and working- class tax cuts disappear after 10 years while those to the rich and powerful are perpetual. This rushed bill is another violation of democratic process since it was cobbled together in back-room caucuses of Republicans and lobbyists and kept secret for weeks — with no public input or hearings.

If the GOP passes this tax bill and further sabotages the Affordable Care Act by repealing the individual mandate, leaving more than 15 million uninsured, it will thankfully hasten the day of reckoning at the polls for these callous GOP politicians and their insidious agenda.

John Witeck

Kamehameha Heights

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Corporations would benefit

Michael Tymn said your headline, “Republican tax plans put corporations over people,” is wrong and that he has “heard enough from several economists … (and) if those economist are right, the corporate tax cuts serve to benefit the ‘people’ in the long run” (“Tax bill coverage biased, distorted,” Star-Advertiser, Letters, Nov. 26).

I believe I can explain how both are correct. The Supreme Court has ruled in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission that corporations are people, too. So the people who would benefit from the Republican tax plans are indeed people. Just not people who file individual tax returns.

Peter Chisteckoff

Mililani

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Fire sprinklers too expensive

We need to reach out to the mayor and the City Council.

I was truly shocked to find that they are considering an amendment to Bill 69 requiring condos built before 1975 to add fire sprinklers.

We have already met building codes at the time our condos were built. Can you really change the rules in the middle of the game? We have not had fire casualties in condos over many years. Marco Polo is the exception, but after how many years and how many thousands of condo units across Honolulu?

There are few who could handle the $50,000 cost. Some of us would rather take a chance of dying than to risk losing the little we have acquired with much sacrifice. They are going to put seniors at risk for losing their property. We have been in our condo for 31 years and if they push this, it will probably force us to sell, if we can find a buyer to take on the $50,000 expense. And then where?

Jan Nilsson

Waikiki

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Build groyne to protect beaches

Many cities construct groyne walls to offset longshore drift eroding sand beaches. The mechanics of groyne walls can be found extensively on YouTube.

Hawaii has natural walls like Hanauma Bay, Makapuu, Kahana Bay, or a single arm of lava reaching into the sea. With the threat of king tides, wind and surf, we have to save our beaches from vanishing.

David Lemke

Palolo