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July 12, 2003 - Saturday
Meda was quoted in a New York Times story yesterday by Jeffrey Gettleman concerning a case down in New Orleans. But, in a now familiar turn, she's never talked to Gettleman. Instead, she was interviewed by an award-winning Louisiana writer who was working with Gettleman but gets no credit in the story.
A friend in Berkeley passed on this tidbit:
A musician friend of mine just recorded the best anti-Bush song ever (imo) "King George Is Back." Witty and succinct. As another friend I emailed this link to replied, "trashing George Bush is never off-topic." Anyway, if you're interested in giving it a listen, here's the link:
It streams in Real Player. I'm hoping all the webby Dean folks will dig it and pass it along.
I haven't had a chance to listen to it yet, but I'll pass it along in hopes that it meets expectations.
July 11, 2003 - Friday
Small world II. Transplanted islander Jahan Byrne (son of the late Desmond Byrne) wrote to say that he checked in yesterday morning as visitor #300,001. He writes: "I think I should get some award, as the numbering is like the millennium - not 299,999 to 300,000 but to 300,001."
The KITV travel issue continues to reverberate. A former Hawaii journalist added a bit of perspective in an email forwarded to me yesterday:
Cannot believe KITV stepped into that one. Still, not a major surprise. One of the problems with all the stations in Hawaii is not just that that have been in a major cost saving mode for the past 15 years, they are also used to taking freebies.
Case in point: About 10-12 years ago, KHON allowed the Hilton Waikoloa Village and Report to pay to fly the station's news team there in exchange for broadcasting the channel 2 news from the resort for an entire week. The hotel paid for everything, including shipping over cameras and all other equipment. The station took a big hit from the Advertiser because of it, and came off looking very poorly.
I disagree with Mike Rosenburg's response that said they viewed it like catching a free military flight to Bosnia. Not the same thing. Not even close. Taking a free trip to Japan with a politician who just happens to be governor really puts you in a bad position. Not only can it color your reporting--even if you deny that possibility---it also increases the likelihood that you'll report favorably on the trip. If you don't, do you think Lingle or the HVCB will to allow you to do this again--for free? Of course not.
On too many occasions, the local stations have sold out for freebies. KITV and KGMB have done it with Disneyland in Anaheim. All expenses paid--hotel, air, etc--as long as you do a live shot (paid for by Disney, of course) for your viewers in Hawaii. KGMB did a week's worth of weather segments there with Kim Gennaula. It was shameful. Mickey Mouse and gang were in the background the entire time.
Another reader had a comment and question: "Unfortunate that the Star-Bulletin wasn't on the KITV trip story as quickly as the Advertiser. Is that the local station the S-B has an arrangement with?"
The answer, I believe, is yes.
July 10, 2003 - Thursday
Small world department. Former Star-Bulletin webmaster Blaine Fergerstrom was visitor number 300,000 yesterday morning, as evidenced by this screen shot he provided. A second view, shown here, shows that the counter hit the magic mark at 5:45 a.m. Hawaii time (you can see the time up in the right hand corner of the image). Congratulations, Blaine!
KITV's decision to send a reporter to accompany Gov. Lingle on her marketing trip to Japan at Hawaii Visitors and Convention Bureau expense, described in Johnny Brannon's story in yesterday's Honolulu Advertiser, has been stirring up a lot of comment. Generally it's seen as a breach of journalistic ethics and a move which exposes both KITV and Lingle to unnecessary criticism. Good move by the Advertiser to feature it on their front page. It brought quick results, as KITV has now decided it will reimburse the travel costs, although this will probably to little to end the debate over the original decision.
As one reader quipped: "Embedding? Or in-bedding?"
| I finally got around to finishing up another annual census of the cats in our household. This silly project has gotten more elaborate over the years, and this year is no exception. If you want to check it out, just click on Ms. Wally's photo to the right, or on the "cat census" button over there below the "Mornin' Dogs". Have fun. |
Click me....
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July 9, 2003 - Wednesday
By the time this gets posted, which will be a little later than normal, that 300,000 visitor mark will have been passed.
And today marks another milestone--one year since the death of our good friend, retired UH Professor Ann Keppel.
Following the Star-Bulletin's double hit on UH president Evan Dobelle, on Sunday (the op-ed focusing on his free spending ways, and Rob Perez's "Raising Cane" column on university secrecy), it seems an appropriate time to add a small footnote to history.
Back in December 2002, records of Dobelle's expenditures from a protocol fund maintained by the UH Foundation were publicly disclosed and UH spokesman Paul Costello was quick to claim credit for the new "openness".
Both the Star-Bulletin and Advertiser duly reported on Dobelle's spending, especially the large amounts for travel, and noted that he reimbursed the Foundation for thousands of dollars in personal expenses that had been charged to the protocol account. But they failed to note that some of those reimbursements were more than half a year late, and came only after university officials were trying to decide how to respond to my formal requests to inspect the records of Dobelle's foundation account.
For example, Dobelle wrote separate checks to the UH Foundation on November 16, 2002, for $1,474.80 and $11,544.93 which included reimbursement for personal expenses from trips as far back as April and May.
"President will issue a personal check upon return from his trip on 5/28/02," said one note attached to a credit card payment made from the protocol account on May 24, but that reimbursement to the foundation was not made until November.
Mainstream reporters who wrote about the disclosures missed the delays, and never questioned the "voluntary" nature of the disclosures. Costello, of course, failed to tell them that the records were released in response to several requests I had made for access, and came only after university lawyers determined that they couldn't avoid disclosure.
Costello, a talented and experienced public relations professional, used the daily reporters to dull the edge of an otherwise potentially damaging disclosure. Knowing that I was writing for Honolulu Weekly, he gave the scoop to the dailies while giving it a positive spin, effectively squeezing my potential story into the margins.
My quest for access to the expenditure records began with an October 3, 2002 letter to the UH Foundation, which was not responded to until December 4, when Foundation president Betsy Sloane denied the request by claiming the foundation isn't subject to the state open records law. On November 24, I addressed a second, similar request to Costello's office.
Initially, Costello tried to refer me back to the foundation, but on December 11 I received a written "notice to requester" advising that the records would be made available for inspection at 10 A.M. on December 18. But when I called a day or two ahead to make final arrangements, Costello informed me that there would be other reporters examining the records at the same time.
It was a brilliant move on his part. Costello contacted the daily reporters and volunteered the records without disclosing that my formal request and underlying threat of litigation had been pried them loose. And then Costello provided other reporters with summaries and totals, while he maintained to me that no ledger or other type of regular account summaries existed.
Costello's fancy footwork did the trick, managing to blunt the critical edge of the stories. It was one of those moments when I got screwed, but ended up having to admire the way that he played the game.
In any case, this is just a footnote to the Dobelle controversy.
July 8, 2003 - Tuesday
Update: It looks like we'll pass the 300,000 visitor mark later today, or early tomorrow at the latest! Watch that counter....
In a flashback to the formation of the Save Our Star-Bulletin group back in 1999, Seattle now boasts a new organization, the Committee for a Two-Newspaper Town.
The group, with the strong backing of the Pacific Northwest Newspaper Guild, is seeking to intervene in the legal case which will determine the future of Seattle's two daily newspapers. There's lots of interesting reading about the Seattle JOA available on the web sites maintained by the committee and the Guild.
| Today would have been George Steele's 57th birthday. George, writer, reporter, poet, friend, and a fixture in the Star-Bulletin's newsroom, died back in March. His family gathered on Saturday, July 5th, on his cousin Kathy Hull's farm on the edge of Hightown, Virginia, to remember George and scatter his ashes. |
George's cousin, Kathy Hull, with her dogs Oakley and Minty, near the spot where George's ashes will remain.Click for larger photo.
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From an on-the-scene report:
Several years ago George had asked Kathy to scatter his ashes "at this tree", the tree they were standing near on the hill overlooking the farmhouse....The farm is lovely and has been in the Hull family for generations. Behind the house at the foot of the hill is where the South Branch of the Potomac River starts.
Kathy is a Disciples of Christ minister as well as a college administrator. She organized the services, printed up programs and printed a booklet with several of George's poems. We all dressed in our loud, Hawaiian-type shirts (as near Hawaiian as we can get this far east) and Kathy gave us each a party lei. Sunhats and sunglasses were worn by all. At 12:45 we headed out to the backside of the hill in a train of cars.
The hill is deceptively steep and its rocky surface is covered with thick, slick grass and sedge. All of us were either middle-aged or aging and that hill looked so steep and the day was so hot! We stopped for a group portrait at the bottom. Two of us stayed there at the gate and the rest of us made our way up as best we could. Kathy wouldn't let us stop -- not at the gate, not halfway up, not under a locust tree, not at a fallen tree. "Do this for George. Just a little farther," in her Virginia accent that makes "farther" sound like "father".
Kathy, her two dogs Oakley and Minty, and I were the first to reach the top. (That's Kathy and her two pals with our leis.) We planned the ashes tossing with the wind and yelled encouragement at everyone. The bare spot in front of Kathy and the dogs was where we all finally stood. On the ground is the Bible that George gave his mother while he was still in high school.
The service was responsive readings, Bible verses, remembrances from family and friends (my own words were trimmed when I realized I couldn't hold up through everything I planned to say), one of George's poems, and some lovely thoughts that Kathy had included at George's mother's funeral. George's Uncle Tommy scattered his ashes. The dogs rather came to life when they sensed that someone was finally moving and had a good time helping Tommy. After prayers we picked our way down the hill and drove to the house for a fine meal.
Well, so long, Mr. George.
July 7, 2003 - Monday
Yesterday's Star-Bulletin op-ed about UH Pres Dobelle turned out to be quite a zinger. One reader commented: "I suspect the Agbayani-Kim-Moberly-Takai piece is intended to be the "broken trust" initiator for the end of Dobelle." But I haven't seen much comment on it, so it's hard to tell whether it struck a chord with the public, or the part of the public that counts on such matters. I suppose this is a "wait and see" situation for now.
Isn't it fascinating to see how quickly public images can change? This weekend we saw young golfer Michelle Wie's dad go from Super Caddy to being declared "Whiner of the Week".
Long-time peace activist Jim Albertini is objecting to a closed-door briefing on military plans for an extensive land grab on the Big Island.
"Brigadier General Charles H. Jacoby, Assistant Division Commander (Operations) of U.S. Army, Hawaii, 25th Infantry Division, has invited a select group of land owners, organizational heads and government officials to 'participate in a discussion on issues that effect land use for our communities and the Army,'" according to Jim Albertini of Malu Aina who received one of the invitations. Albertini said, "the invitation only meeting is set for Wednesday, July 16, 2003 from 5:30-7:30pm at the Hilo Hawaiian Hotel but I won't be going because of the 'closed-door nature' of the meeting." Albertini said, "military land use issues effect our whole community and the meetings should be open to the public and the press."
Albertini and others are planning their own open meeting to air the issues this Wednesday, July 9th 6:30-8pm at the Kea`au Community Center.
According to Albertini's press release:
Albertini said, "the military has not learned to do what our mothers taught all of us: clean up after yourself." Albertini said, "hundreds of thousands of acres of land on this island are littered with unexploded ordnance, left from years of former and ongoing military training." Albertini said, "the focus of the July 9th meeting will be Military Clean-up NOT Build-up. There is a need to clean-up more than 50 former and current military sites on Hawaii Island (47 of which have known hazards), and stop the 23,000-acre military build-up at Pohakuloa planned under what's called 'Army Transformation.'"
(for further information, contact Albertini at 808-966-7622 or ja@interpac.net.)
| I spent the weekend following cats and collecting new photos for an up-to-date Chesney-Lind cat census.
The only problem is that I ended up with too many good pictures, with the result that the simply little project has turned more elaborate. Now it's going to take a day or two more to complete. Stay tuned.
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 Mr. Toby
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I made a routine run to the VCA Animal Hospital in Kaneohe yesterday afternoon. Duke was due for a round of shots. Last time he was there back in October, Duke weighed just over six pounds. Yesterday he hit the scales at over 13 pounds. And this time Mr. Lindsey turned out to indeed have some blood in his urine, so he's home with a bottle of yummy pink antibiotic.
July 6, 2003 - Sunday
Reporter Jim Dooley and the Advertiser hit a homerun with today's look inside the Honolulu Police Department, based on documents disclosed only because of litigation pursued by the paper. This is just one of the instances in which the Gannett's willingness to put money behind into opening up public records has paid off. They're way ahead of the competition in this regard and deserve credit for their aggressiveness.
UH President Evan Dobelle is under fire today in a Star-Bulletin Op-Ed by Mark Takai, chairman of the House Higher Education Committee, and several others with UH ties.
The National Association of State Budget Officers has produced a fiscal survey of the states which puts our own budget woes into context.
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