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by Jacob Shafer

August 20, 2009

HYPER LOCAL

The Federal Emergency Management Agency and state Department of Land and Natural Resources held a meeting in Kihei this week to answer questions about revised Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRM), which gauge flood risks for different areas. According to a County press release, “Major changes to the FIRM include newly flood-mapped areas of Waikapu, as well as Kamaole and Kaluaihakoko Gulches in Kihei. Other areas affected are located throughout the island.” (You can view the maps—and if you’re a homeowner it’d be a good idea—at gis.hawaiinfip.org/fhat.) It’s interesting that this news arrives in the midst of a national debate about health care. With flood insurance, the most at-risk homes are required to have coverage. With health care, it’s exactly the opposite: the more at-risk you are, the harder it is to get a policy. Gee—almost seems like the system’s rigged in favor of the insurance companies… I’ve had several people contact me about the beatings that occurred this past weekend in Makawao, in conjunction with an event we promoted in the August 13 Picks of the Week. Though details remain murky, a Maui News account confirmed that one man was hospitalized with “major facial injuries,” including a “shattered orbital.” Witnesses say some of the young men responsible were wearing mouth guards, suggesting this was no spur-of-the-moment attack. Police are treating it as a felony assault; at press time no arrests had been announced. Excessive violence is always deplorable, but in this case the fact that it happened outside a fundraiser for a youth program adds a layer of tragic irony… There are a lot of reasons to blast the Cubs fan who dumped a beer on Maui boy Shane Victorino during a game at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Most of the more obvious ones have been discussed ad nauseum. Here’s one that’s flown under the radar: When security shows up to nab the culprit, the guy who actually did it (some suburbanite named Johnny Macchione who later confessed, apologized and turned himself in, presumably after his mommy threatened to take away his allowance) can be seen pointing to another fan, who gets kicked out while Macchione slips away. Let this be a lesson kids: if you must be an idiot, at least don’t be a coward…

LOCAL

As Hawaii marks 50 years of statehood, everyone from the Honolulu Advertiser to the New York Times has weighed in, with the result a predictable mix of nostalgia-laced platitudes tempered by parenthetical nods to Native Hawaiian sovereignty and the sagging visitor industry. So far no one, as far as I’ve seen, has nailed the issue in all its complexity and contradiction, if such a thing is even possible… It’s been nearly 48 years since leftist radical Dwight Eisenhower (who also, incidentally, signed the Admissions Act) warned against “the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex.” In the intervening decades those words have proven to be frighteningly prescient. Exhibit Z: an August 17 Pacific Business News item titled “Hawaii companies get military contracts.” The companies in question are Oahu construction outfit Nan Inc. and Tesoro Hawaii Corps., a subsidiary of the Texas-based oil giant. Nan Inc. will get $39.7 million to build housing for the Navy, while Tesoro netted $186.7 million to provide jet fuel. Defense Department figures show that, since 2003, the two companies have received close to $1 billion in combined military contracts. That seems like a lot—and it is—but it’s all relative: in the same timeframe, Lockheed Martin has gobbled up more than $73 billion. (For a breakdown of those contracts and a look at the hauls of other companies, visit militaryindustrialcomplex.com.) How about a little more from Ike: “[The] conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence—economic, political, even spiritual—is felt in every city, every statehouse, every office of the federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications.”… Repent ye therefore, and be converted: The state Department of Taxation says it collected more than $14 million in May and June during a month-long amnesty period wherein financial sinners were offered a chance to make good on unpaid or underreported taxes without penalty. Though the “get out of jail free” card has been rescinded, “officials still welcome taxpayers coming forward,” according to a Honolulu Star-Bulletin report. I bet they do… 

NOT LOCAL

The reaction to Whole Foods CEO John Mackey’s Wall Street Journal op/ed has been a tad overblown. Mackey, for those unfamiliar, offered a critique of Obama’s health care proposal (though there isn’t, as far as I can tell, really a proposal to critique—but whatever). Mackey’s argument is the classic free market mantra: keep insurance private, deregulate the industry and everyone will prosper, except for the people who don’t, but they must not have worked hard enough. (I’m paraphrasing of course, but here’s something Mackey actually wrote: “While all of us can empathize with those who are sick, how can we say that all people have any more of an intrinsic right to health care than they have an intrinsic right to food, clothing, owning their own homes, a car or a personal computer?” That’s right: access to medicine = owning a Dell.) Anyway, my point is that, while you may disagree with Mackey, don’t act all shocked that the owner of a big corporation is fiscally conservative and opposed to government regulation. What I take issue with isn’t Mackey’s original piece, but a blog entry he posted on the Whole Foods site three days later. Though he didn’t back down from his main stance, Mackey did offer two “clarifications”: the piece was his opinion and not that of Whole Foods, which has “no official position on the issue”; and the editors at the WSJ screwed him. To the first point, though he doesn’t explicitly say, “I’m speaking on behalf of my company,” Mackey mentions Whole Foods (which is opening a store in Kahului next year, by the way) multiple times, and uses the company’s health plan as a model for what the country should be doing. Also, to reiterate: he posted the message on the Whole Foods blog. Forgive us for seeing the line as slightly blurred. To the second point: blaming an editor for twisting your words (yes, of course I’m biased) is weak to the weakest power. You don’t want someone else to alter your words? Use a tiny fraction of your vast fortune and publish the damn thing yourself. So, to recap: John Mackey, government-subsidized health care opponent—totally cool in a free society; John Mackey, backpedaling, buck-passing weasel—not cool, free society or no. Maui Time Weekly, Jacob Shafer