Letters | 12-15-15

Violence that isn’t condemned is condoned

In our own small West Hawaii community, a person who used his first amendment right of free speech had his property vandalized. Tragically, it appears likely that his vocal support for giving aid to suffering refugees was met with extreme intolerance and violence.

Being free to voice differing opinions, even in the sternest terms, is key to working toward peaceful solutions to our country’s — and community’s — most pressing challenges. Violence to individuals or property is not.

Whether you agree with Aaron “Jake” Jacobs isn’t important. What’s important is that thinking individuals agree that it is unacceptable and even embarrassing that an intelligent, caring individual in our close-knit, traditionally progressive, tolerant community has experienced physical retaliation for expressing his point of view. It behooves all of us to rise in condemnation of that violence, whether it occurs in our, or someone else’s, backyard and to stand together against those who use cowardly violence rather than constructive approaches to expressing their views.

Janice Palma-Glennie

Kailua-Kona

Maybe all inaccurate items shouldn’t be published

I got quite a kick out of Ken Obenski’s letter to the editor on Nov. 21 about misinformation in letters to the editor. He apparently believes that all letters containing them should not be considered for publication. Considering that his own letter contained several punctuation mistakes would mean, I guess, that his own letter should not have been published. He apparently is unfamiliar with the current rules of punctuation regarding the use of commas. His letter contained two such mistakes.

I do understand that his opinion is perhaps at least somewhat valid. Accuracy is important to the validity of any opinion. However, does he not realize that many or even most newspaper articles printed may have at least some inaccuracies in them? That, to extend his train of thought, would mean that most newspapers would not be able to publish more than maybe one or two pages per day, from what I’ve seen in my nearly 70 years of reading them.

I do agree at least partially with his idea, but getting an editor to actually correct all the mistakes, even in a small paper such as this one, is highly unlikely. So, all the published articles that end in the middle of a sentence, all those with misleading captions, and all those with questionable information will just have to stay as they are.

Too bad most of our children are no longer being taught the finer points of grammar and spelling, as well as punctuation and syntax. As author/astronomer Carl Sagan once wrote to me, syntax and accuracy are always very important and quite necessary for a publication to be worth reading. He was a stickler for detail in everything he wrote, and I highly valued all his corrections and his opinions.

Carol Buck

Waimea

County officials need to take look at abandoned vehicle issue

I write regarding Stephen Koolpe’s letter “No place on island for dead vehicles?” It is not so much the anointed folks that need to wake up as it is the appointed folks.

Perhaps Bobby Jean Leithead-Todd, of English major fame as well as being the appointed Hawaii County director of Environmental Management, would be kind enough to furnish everyone with a poem on the subject of abandoned vehicles.

Left in fields of weeds grown high,

And on side streets, little do they care …

Well, you get the idea.

Sylvia Owens

Kailua-Kona