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Since November 2, 1999
They were moving in office furniture and people around up in the Star-Bulletin's 5th floor offices over at Restaurant Row to make room for owner David Black, who is expected to be arriving any day now for a stay of at least a couple of weeks. They had to displace at least one sales manager to create a suitable executive office. Black's anticipated arrival has stirred up the newsroom rumor mill again as staffers wonder what's up. One rumor is that he's coming out to make an announcement of some kind, while most believe he's taking the helm as the paper seeks to cope with the suddenly slowed economy.Burl Burlingame's Honolulu Newspaper War site is reporting that the Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC) has demanded that Gannett cease using an ABC letter in its advertising campaign attacking the Star-Bulletin's circulation claims. Apparently the use of the letter violates the same ABC publicity policies that Gannett accuses the Star-Bulletin of tripping over. It's a tricky minefield out there in the news war!
The first "live broadcast" from the Star-Bulletin newsroom debuted on KITV Wednesday night, with S-B reporter Rod Antone presenting highlights of stories set to appear in the Star-Bulletin the next morning. This is apparently destined to be a regular on-the-air feature.All the doom & gloom economic talk has added another layer of worry for Star-Bulletin staffers, who had been increasingly optimistic about the paper's future prior to the post-Sept. 11 economic woes. The last few weeks have yielded good news in terms of increased circulation coupled with fears of lost advertising, leaving staffers nervous and somewhat bemused.
Two different collections of newspaper front pages from around the globe provide a fascinating look at how the September 11 attacks were presented. The International Newspaper Marketing Association gives a good overview, while the Poynter Institute adds higher-resolution pdf files of each cover. The different approaches to the same event are fascinating, as are the regional/cultural differences and similarities.
I read through the current issue of Pacific Business News without even noticing the large Honolulu Advertiser ad. I had to pull the issue out of the stack of papers after a friend asked if I'd seen it.
The ad copy reiterates results of the Advertiser's special circulation audit covering the three months after the breakup of the joint operating agreement with the Star-Bulletin, as well as its pointed critique of as-yet unaudited numbers is currently sharing with clients.
Click on the egg carton to read the full message.
"When you buy a dozen eggs,
you expect to get 12."A conversation with the United reservation agent while rebooking a flight yesterday yielded an interesting comment. The agent said United has already had to recall some furloughed employees because of a rebound in business. With any luck, this is a leading indicator for Hawaii's economy.
For more on the international situation: The London Guardian ran an interesting little story this week on the peace protests that have quickly emerged on American college campuses, with a link to Peaceful Justice, which is tracking and supporting the network of campus-based peace groups and activities. The Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL) in Washington also has a useful site with straight forward information reflecting their long-established role as lobbyists for peace and justice from a Quaker perspective.
September 26, 2001 - Wednesday
It happened again last week, another hidden "story behind the story" that's still waiting to be told. Saturday's Star-Bulletin reported that an apparent charity scam was busted when a solicitation call to an Aala bar was answered by a police detective. The scammers allegedly claimed to be collecting funds for a World Trade Center relief fund on behalf of the Honolulu Police Department, and arrests were made when a "runner" arrived to pick up the money.From the story: "Police said that on Wednesday one of the suspects, a 40-year old male, called Club Yuraku Cho and spoke to an off-duty narcotics detective, believing the detective to be the owner of the bar."
Hello? And what's the off-duty narcotics detective doing down at Yuraku Cho playing owner? The story doesn't say. Maybe he was there in an official capacity, undercover. We don't know. Was the question asked? We don't know that, either.
You may recall that there I noted a similar incident just a few months ago at a Keeaumoku Street club where officers were hanging out.
Perhaps this is more than a coincidence, folks, and deserves a closer look.
A column that originally appeared in the Tri-City Herald has Hawaii residents up in arms, according to a story by Dan Nakaso in today's Honolulu Advertiser. Columnist Karen Zacharias was stranded in Waikiki after the Sept. 11 attacks, and returned home to Kennewick, WA to write about the atmosphere in the heart of the tourist Mecca, which she found shockingly unpatriotic. You can read the full column at IsleNews Forums.It seems that if the State can't or won't do it, someone else will. The environmental group Life of the Land has carefully scanned dozens of documents from the Public Utilities Commission and made them publicly available on the group's web site, www.lifeoftheland.org. The documents aren't actually "unavailable" from the PUC, it's just an expensive and frustrating process to get to any of them through the agency. LOL deserves a lot of recognition for this good deed.
Cat people will recognize this scene, as Ms. Harry heads for what must be the sweetest water in the household. Just ask her.
I went out on the deck a few minutes ago, and she immediately let out a cry from down below in the yard and trotted out from the banana trees with her current trophy, the carcass of another small rat. She's down there showing off with it now, but she'll probably be back in for a drink soon.
Such are the mornings when I'm stuck at home. Hopefully I'll be back walking on the beach before too long.
Click for larger photo of Harriet
Our sometimes neighbor, Eric Herter, owns the house next door where the legendary Hilo Hattie spent the last few years of her life. Eric, a talented writer and photographer, is now living and working in Vietnam with his wife, Hoa, and daughter, but was on the mainland, starting back to Vietnam, on September 11. He sent the following letter to the New York Times but doesn't think it was published.9/14/01Our national response to the brutal events of September 11th will say much about America's character, and will be closely watched by people around the world. If our response is perceived as appropriate and just, we will be strengthening the forces of decency and democracy in the world. If it's perceived as an inappropriate and cruel application of our vast power, we'll be squandering an unprecedented opportunity.
During the Vietnam war, a single guerilla fighter could fire at US aircraft from inside a neutral village and provoke an overwhelming US retaliatory response. Often we bombed and napalmed the whole village, creating myriad new enemies. Thus small numbers of enemies with little popular support provoked us into reactions that made us look brutal and unfair to most Vietnamese, and to many others as well.
A response to Tuesday's events that shows that we're no more concerned with the lives of innocent people than our attackers will likely lead to an ever-escalating series of terrorist attacks in the US followed by US retaliations that create yet more terrorists and lead us into a global quagmire in which there are no winners.
We have an extraordinary opportunity to transform the worldwide support we''re receiving into continuing respect by our by a wise and effective response to this provocation. If our response is appropriate and firm -- but also fair in our efforts to protect the lives of the innocent -- we will isolate the terrorists. If not, we play into their hands.
Eric Herter
Former USAID worker in Vietnam
Eric's the grandson of Christian A. Herter, former Massachusetts governor and Secretary of State during the latter years of the Eisenhower administration.
Interestingly, Eric was editor of Discovery: The Hawaiian Odyssey (Bishop Museum Press, 1993), a project also worked on by Blaine Fergerstrom, now Star-Bulletin webmeister, and Curt Sanburn, current editor of Honolulu Weekly. A beautiful book, by the way.
A friend mused yesterday...what if the U.S. had never seized Texas from Mexico, nor purchased Florida from Spain? How different this year might have been.It's been almost a week since I was able to walk on the beach and see the sunrise. Major withdrawal symptoms. There's a tangible absence, an ache that isn't specific, but nags its constant reminder. Hopefully the knee will heal soon. Can't be soon enough.
Cat update. Wally is on the front deck, a few feet away, trying valiantly to cough up a hairball. Someone else deposited one under our dresser overnight. Harry is my suspect on that. Silverman's lounging on a chair on the deck. He's been hanging around the house a lot more since our neighbor rescued a dog, now dubbed Black Betty, effectively removing a part of Silverman's former territory. Silverman even slept in our bedroom for at least part of the last two nights, a major breakthrough for this former wandering cat.
Harry & Kili, meanwhile, have taken to spending long hours down in part of the vacant 4-acre state-owned parcel just below our house. They probably go down there and hunt, then add hours of sleep as well. When I want to locate them, I have to walk down the stairs off the back deck, across the yard, over to the left of a large Hibiscus plant that stands about 8 feet tall, then straight out along a little trail trampled into the dense California grass, across layers of cycad palm leaves dumped there to rot, just far enough to get around a growth of so-called "beefsteak plant" at the corner of our property, then connecting to a smaller path that branches down the hill. If I stand there and call Harry's name several times, I can usually hear a faint answering cry that gradually grows louder until she bursts out of the grasses below and comes running happily up the trail to greet me. Kili usually responds as well, as if she's down there simply as a chaperone for the youngster's outing.
The reunion is always a happy occasion, since I worry a lot when our cats roam. There's a layer of guilt about ignoring the standard advice, which is to raise cats indoors where hazards are limited. We used to have indoor cats when we lived in Honolulu, but it's been a different story since we moved to Kaaawa. For several years it was apartheid. Our original city cats lived indoors, while the country cats that quickly started adopting us lived outdoors or in the garage, taking their meals on the front steps.
Then we decided to have our bathrooms remodeled, and we couldn't figure out any way to keep the cats out of trouble except to open the doors and let them all out while the contractors were here, and then allow them return on their own. They appeared to love the experience, and have all been inside-outside cats ever since. They love it, of course, but it does take its toll. We argue the pros and cons from time to time, but realize it would be very difficult to turn back the clock, especially since we've now got too many cats to comfortably share a house of this size.
More pictures added. Of cats, of course. And the last couple of sunrises before my knee crapped out, including September 11 in Kaaawa. Click on Lizzie's photo or on the "photo gallery" banner at the top of the page for today's updated gallery.
Ms. Lizzie
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