Musings: A Sham and a Shame

Let’s see, what’s new? Well, the days are getting longer now, a minute or so on either end, and already it’s not quite so black when Koko and I go out walking in the mornings.

And Kauai is finally getting its first drug treatment center, but wouldn’t ya know it, it’s a five-star job for the richy-rich refugees from Malibu, not the local lost boys. The Garden Island reports it’s near Kilauea, although proprietor Kat Conway won’t reveal the exact location because she “hopes it can keep a low profile that helps patients heal.”

I hate to break it to her, but it’s kind of hard for a 10,000-square-foot estate with a spa and a private path to a secluded beach to keep a low profile. From the pictures, it’s also obviously on ag land — perhaps a former vacation rental? — so I hope she got a special use permit.

Of course, if it was a rehab center for locals, you know folks would be squawking their heads off, with the NIMBY factor running high.

So as the rich get to deal with their demons in luxurious seclusion, served by a butler, chef and trainer, the poor addicts get their asses thrown in jail. And that's really a shame — if you believe in justice, that is.

Reforming the drug laws is a topic I’ll take up on my radio show this Thursday, which runs from 4 to 6 p.m. on KKCR (www.kkcr.org, FM 90.9, 91.9, 92.7). I’ll have two guests from LEAP — Law Enforcement Against Prohibition — talking about the national scene and Maui Sen. J. Kalani English and Jeanne Ohta of the Drug Policy Forum of Hawaii talking about local initiatives, including the decriminalization of marijuana, a bill to license medical marijuana dispensaries and more. I hope you, and Police Chief Darryl Perry, will tune in. We’ll be taking questions, too, at 808-826-7771.

What else is happening? Oh, yes, the Kauai-Niihau Island Burial Council is finally going to have a meeting, the first in many months, and the oft-amended Burial Treatment Plan for Joe Brescia’s lot in Naue is finally on the agenda, which was finally released, just four days before the meeting.

Of course, it’s all teetering on the edge of meaninglessness, seeing as how the house atop the burials is nearly complete and the Planning Commissioners already made it quite clear that they won’t do anything even if the Burial Council again rejects the BTP.

It’s all been a giant sham, with the many revisions of what is essentially the same plan, the pretense at consultation with interested parties, Gov. Lingle’s lengthy delays in appointing members of the Burial Council, which prevented it from having a quorum and meeting in a timely manner, the bullying of Burial Council members into believing they had no power, the quasi-judicial hearings before commissioners who were bullied into thinking that even asking the great JB to show he was in compliance with his permits — and of course, he isn't — somehow amounted to the equivalent of a “taking.”

But the pain that many are feeling over this issue, well, that part is real. As Aunty Nani Rogers noted in the email that circulated the Burial Council agenda:

I am hoping for a strong showing of bodies there, to strongly support us and stop the outrageous and flagrant acts of desecration to our na iwi kupuna and the great harm to the spirits of those that are defending them. Yes, my spirit is eha, [hurt, in pain, aching] it’s been so for over a year, not just me but many, many others. That kind of harm/damage is ana `ole, immeasurable, and the worst kind used to punish any living human being.

And that's really a shame.