If you’ve already read the headlines and need a bit more politics, Rasmussen Reports provides results of their daily presidential election tracking poll, which follows short term changes in voter opinion. It’s worth a spot among your bookmarks.

The San Francisco Chronicle carried a eulogy for the ocean liner Independence by Carl Nolte, who describes the ship’s mysterious final destination which appears to be a scrap yard in an undisclosed country.

For those who don’t recall this period, the Independence began cruising Hawaiian waters a couple of years after Pacific Far East Line pulled the last of the former Matson white ships out of service in 1978.

The ship sailed every Saturday for 21 years on weeklong Hawaiian cruises under the U.S. flag. For a while, the Constitution joined the Independence in Hawaii but it was withdrawn and sank on its way to the scrap yard in 1996.
The Independence carried on alone. It was a good life in Hawaii, and a popular service. As late as 2000, the Independence received the Ship of the Year award from the Steamship Historical Society of America.
But the parent company of American Hawaiian Cruises went bankrupt when tourism dropped after the 2001 terrorist attacks. The ship completed its final voyage and sailed from Honolulu, arriving in San Francisco on Nov. 8, 2001. It was the last voyage under its own power.

Interesting that this comes as NCL pulls its two ships out of Hawaii.

A reader who recognizes that he might be among the last “over the air” television viewers in town wonders why nothing is being reported about KHON’s broadcast woes.

Interesting that there’s been no news of the now regular week-or-more outages at KHON-TV.

We must be the last hold-outs against cable on Oahu, thriftily struggling with Radio Shack rabbit ears to get FREE TV.

Which we generally do, except that since December KHON has been off the air – off-and-on – for several weeks.
As it is still tonight …

In January the story was that their over-the-air broadcast is via a 50-year-old transmitter, which has become a challenge to their engineers – a transmitter not in keeping, it would seem, with their smart new studio quarters at 88 Piikoi.

Perhaps trying to hold off for a new digital-capable transmitter until closer to February, 2009?

Surely indicative of the hold cable has on Oahu …

Still – I’m surprised there has been no ‘news’ about Joe Moore’s over-the-air disappearance. Not even something on their website to explain.

An Advertiser story today on a UH volleyball player’s unusual haircut.

“Sam lives in our house now, and he’s part of the crew, so he had to do it,” Grgas said. “I was like, ‘You cut my hair first, and I’ll cut yours second.’ ”

Grgas received a full buzz cut. Then Grgas shaved only the top of Morehouse’s head, in a semi-circle, then sprinted away.

“I put the blades in my room, then locked my room,” Grgas said, laughing. “I said, ‘You have to leave it. This is your initiation for this semester.’ It’s part of the tradition.”

Question: Sorry to rain on the parade, but doesn’t this sound like a form of “hazing”, which is prohibited on campus? Should there have been red flags spotted when reporting it?

Here’s a bit of the UH policy:

UHM has a “no hazing” policy. Hazing is defined “as including, but not limited to, any action taken or situation created, intentionally, whether on or off University premises, to produce mental or physical discomfort, embarrassment, harassment or ridicule. Such activities and situations include paddling in any form; creation of excessive fatigue; physical and psychological discomfort; wearing, publicly, apparel which is conspicuous and not normally in good taste; engaging in public stunts and jokes; morally degrading or humiliating games and activities; late night sessions which interfere with scholastic activities; and any other activities which are not consistent with University policies and procedures.”

From The Onion: “Kitchen-Floor Conflict Intensifies As Rival House Cats Claim Same Empty Bag”.

Another reader is somewhat desperately looking for a photo or scan of the front page of the Star-Bulletin STATEHOOD edition to polish off a book project he’s working on. The Star-Bulletin has no history, state archives had no copy, etc., etc. I send him to the Advertiser, which owns the former Star-Bulletin files. If you have or know of a copy, please let me know (ian@ilind.net) and I’ll pass the information on to him.

For those of you one the mainland enjoying single digit temperatures and lovely snow, here’s a lonely sufferer who had staked out a spot under the palms at Waialae Beach Park a couple of days ago when I stopped by to check out conditions. Just click for a larger version.