A new community group calling itself “The Friends of the Honolulu Advertiser” is planning a press conference at 11 a.m. today in front of the Advertiser building at 605 Kapiolani.

According to a message circulating yesterday:

It will probably last about 30 mins. Our committee members may have an informal meeting afterwards to discuss and plan future activities.

Our delegation to the Advertiser will announce the formation and purpose of our group–The Friends of The Honolulu Advertiser and our delegation will report on their 90-minute meeting last Thursday with Advertiser publisher Lee Webber and the editor Mark Platte. Webber told our delegation that the paper plans to go ahead with the lay-offs, and he also said that he doubts there will be a strike by the employees. Thanks to our five delegation members (Richard Port, AQ McElrath, Jean King, Amy Agbayani, and Mike Golojuch) for their time and quality effort.

SO PLEASE COME AT 11 AM TUESDAY TO THE MEDIA CONFERENCE AND SPREAD THE WORD AND INVITE OTHERS. This event we hope will help encourage the Advertiser employees who are reportedly planning their own actions later in the week and improve prospects for maintaining two newspapers as information sources for the people. Word is that the lay-offs may come down by or after Aug. 8.

The flap over the Manoa-Palolo-Kakaaako city council seat revealed one useful thing–it called attention to one big fissure in the Democratic Party. Apparently Mayor Mufi’s faction sees Duke Bainum as a major threat. And the boundaries of Mufi’s faction extend out to encompass the now outgoing House Majority Leader Kurk Caldwell. I don’t really know much about those party splits, but it would be most interesting to know how they played out here.

Some folks have gotten carried away in criticizing Bainum for his last minute filing. I see some comments referring to him as a “carpetbagger”. But remember that Duke’s no late arrival to island politics. He served in the legislature before earning high marks during two full terms on the city council.

During that time he was one of the “go to” guys for good government advocates and reformers. Is that why he’s considered a threat?

Bainum was rated “Best candidate to run for mayor in 2002” in a Honolulu Weekly readers’ poll back in 2001.

Some reasons cited:

“only a doctor can cure,” “sincere,” “honest,” “smart,” “integrity,” “already rich,” “in touch with public,” “down to earth,” “not an asshole,” “who else is there?” “dedication and honesty,” “the rest look like idiots.”

I also find it odd that some critical observers seem surprised–indeed, shocked–to discover that political candidates are just that–political.

They don’t exist in a vacuum.

A candidate’s friends and associates, backers and opponents, can often tell you more about the candidate than their own personal background.

In this case, Ann Kobayashi appears to have given Bainum a heads up on her decision to file for mayor. Let’s give Kobayashi credit for that decision. She obviously made a decision that Bainum’s past support for openness, accountability, and ethics would benefit her constituents. Shocking? I don’t think so. Wouldn’t you expect that she would do her best to favor someone she feels will conduct themselves as she has?

I’m suspicious of those who had no objection to Kobayashi running unopposed, but now puff up with indignation now that it turns out that Bainum is the last candidate standing. Same thing with critics of Duke’s late move into the 5th district. The list of office holders who moved into a district in order to run would be quite long, and in Duke’s case the district overlaps with the areas he represented before, so it’s not very much of a stretch.

But it is clear that after the election, Duke will have to earn the trust of his new district.

Several people have asked me for comment on the case of HTA director Rex Johnson.

Johnson is accused of forwarding emails with pornographic videos and images to friends. We don’t know the specific nature of the images, their number, or the recipients.

I have to say that Johnson is not one of my favorite public servants. He’s the only person in my reporting career to have responded to a request for comment on a story with a string of unquotable expletives.

I found these comments made here back when Johnson was appointed to the HTA position in 2002″

Reading the Star-Bulletin’s account of Rex Johnson’s appointment appointment as director of the Hawaii Tourism Authority gave me the chills. I have a vivid memory of phoning Johnson for comment on a story back when he was the state director of transportation. It was in December, probably in 1993. Johnson spent so much time hurling profanity at me that I could barely find anything that could appear in a daily newspaper. “Expletive deleted” was a necessary phrase for me that day. I have never experienced a display of this kind by a public official in 30 years of dealing with various levels of government.

The story that set Rex off dealt with his department’s misuse of restricted airport funds to buy a racetrack favored by Gov. Waihee’s administration, a transaction later determined to be illegal after an extensive federal audit.

For the full comment, click here and scroll down tot he July 26, 2002 entry.

I don’t feel much different today. I don’t know what qualifications Johnson had for this position with the Hawaii Tourism Authority except a history of cooperating with those in power. If he had expertise in tourism, it was a well-kept secret. But he did have friends in key positions.

Which makes me wonder. An HPD employee who downloaded sexual images at work wasn’t just fired, he was prosecuted.

I thought that was excessive. Others obviously didn’t.

But for fairness sake, I would certainly want to know what distinguishes Johnson’s sexual images from those of the HPD employee.

Leslie Lang, the freelancer behind the Hamakua Springs blog, has now launched her own blog. Lang’s a pretty good writer, so do stop by and check it out.

Meanwhile, I’m heading to the airport about 4:30 a.m. to drop Meda for a flight to San Diego, where she’s heading for a workshop. So this morning’s entry is necessarily truncated.