The Mystery of Hawaiian History

Correcting historical revisionism and misconceptions promoted by the Akaka Bill

Akaka bill — Important newly published historical and legal analysis by Ryan William Nohea Garcia

Aug 27

Posted by Ken Conklin in Uncategorized | Comments off

 

A major historical and legal analysis of the Akaka bill has just been published  in a well-respected scholarly law journal.  The 78-page article appears in the current issue of the Asian-Pacific Law & Policy Journal published by the William S. Richardson School of Law at the University of Hawaii.  

The article analyzes the Akaka bill in light of federal Indian policy for tribal recognition, the history of the Kingdom of Hawaii as a multiracial government, the issue whether Congress can convert an ethnic group into a political entity, etc.  As often happens with articles in scholarly legal journals, the footnotes probably take up more space than the body of text; however, the article is understandable for non-lawyers and extremely interesting for anyone who has been following the controversy over the Akaka bill. 

Ryan William Nohea Garcia, “Who Is Hawaiian, What Begets Federal Recognition, and How Much Blood Matters.” Asian-Pacific Law & Policy Journal, Vol. 11, No. 2, 2010, pp. 85-162.
The entire article can be downloaded directly from the journal’s website — copy/paste this URL into your internet browser:

http://tinyurl.com/akakagarcia

Here are the abstract and the conclusion as published in the article.

ABSTRACT 

The Akaka bill proposes to federally recognize a Hawaiian governing entity similar to those of federally recognized Indian tribes. As the Akaka bill will institutionalize a political difference between Hawaiians and non-Hawaiians, who is Hawaiian is a timely, and controversial, issue. Also controversial is whether Congress possesses the authority to federally recognize a Hawaiian governing entity. This article addresses three questions that probe the heart of the controversy surrounding the Akaka bill: who is Hawaiian, what begets federal recognition, and how much blood matters. After analyzing relevant Indian jurisprudence, this article demonstrates that political history, not indegeneity, begets federal recognition. As such, it is the political-historical, not racial, definition of Hawaiian that is legally significant to the Akaka bill. Since, however, the Akaka bill utilizes an ethnic Hawaiian blood eligibility criterion, another important question – and one Justice Breyer raised in Rice v. Cayetano – is how much blood is necessary to distinguish ideological self-identification from legitimate racial identity. To the extent racial preferences may coexist with the equal protection components of the Constitution, this article contends that a preponderance of preferred blood is the logical quantum, but a fifty percent requirement is the most practicable.

CONCLUSION

The Akaka bill is novel in that it is the first Congressional attempt to federally recognize a non-Indian entity, and to do so in a fashion inconsistent with the political history of the former governing entity it is ostensibly recognizing. Under a different view, the Akaka bill is novel in that it endeavors to federally recognize a government to collectively represent an entire ethnic group based upon shared indigeneity, rather than political history. But political history, not indegeneity, begets federal recognition. As a result the Akaka bill faces invalidation because its political-historical inconsistencies – most of all with regard to who is Hawaiian – raise a number of cognizable legal issues potentially fatal to the bill. Its blood-based eligibility criterion further raises the question of how much ethnic blood is necessary to distinguish legitimate racial identification from ideological association. To the extent that racial preferences may coexist with the equal protection components of the Constitution, a preponderance of blood is the logical quantum, but a fifty percent requirement is the most practicable.

Violence and threats of violence in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement

Aug 25

Posted by Ken Conklin in Commentary, News, Uncategorized | Comments off

 

A scholarly lecture in Hilo on Sunday August 22 was disrupted by Hawaiian sovereignty activists.  Ironically, the lecture focused on Islamist violence and raised the question whether Hawaiian sovereignty activists might become radicalized in the same way as the Islamists.  The Hawaiian activists didn’t like the topic or the facts being reported.  Sovereignty activists have behaved in similar ways at other public events as documented later; including threats of bodily harm to schoolchildren and to adults at an attempted Statehood Day celebration.  
For more details about what happened at the lecture in Hilo on Sunday, see an article in the libertarian-oriented Hawaii Political Info online newspaper, at
http://hawaiipoliticalinfo.org/node/3276
A major webpage is entitled “Violence and threats of violence to push demands for Hawaiian sovereignty — past, present, and future”.   See
http://tinyurl.com/2su9pa
For discussion of the “big picture” see the book “Hawaiian Apartheid: Racial Separatism and Ethnic Nationalism in the Aloha State” at
http://tinyurl.com/2a9fqa

Jim Marino on Tribal Gaming (Part 1)

Aug 24

Posted by Malia Hill in Commentary | Comments off

A big part of the debate over the Akaka Bill has revolved around exactly what rights and privileges will belong to the new Native Hawaiian “tribe” following reorganization, and with the issue of casino gaming and gambling long holding a contentious place in Hawaiian politics, it was inevitable that the proposed bill would have to address the issue .  Some believe that the prohibition on gaming in the Akaka Bill is sufficient to put the matter to rest, while others (including this blog) have pointed out that the language of the bill may not be the final word on the matter–especially with so much money at stake.

Under the circumstances, I thought it would be interesting to look at the history of the development of Indian gaming in another context (namely, California), and am therefore happy to introduce the first part in a series of guest columns by Jim Marino, an attorney from Santa Barbara who is an expert on the issue.  These columns were originally published earlier this year  in the Santa Ynez Valley Journal, and manage the rare feat of being both interesting and educational.  Enjoy:

HISTORY AND IMPACTS OF INDIAN GAMING IN CALIFORNIA
Santa Ynez Valley Journal
By Jim Marino, Guest Columnist
April 15, 2010

(Part 1)

It has been almost 10 years exactly since Indian casino gambling was legalized in California. Very few people know the history of Indian gambling casinos in California so this is a good time to review that history. I will do this is a five-part series covering the origin of Indian gambling in California up to the present time.

As public attitudes loosened toward gambling in general, many states began to expand legalized gambling. Betting on horse racing at race tracks had long been permitted. The only limitation was the use “bookies” or other off-track intermediaries to place bets, collect and pay off bets made on horses. Many cities also had a thriving underground “lottery” system usually called the “numbers rackets.”

People picked numbers and made a bet, the numbers were then selected often by using the winning numbers of horses running in certain races at a particular race track. Similarly, though probably illegal, Saturday night “penny ante” poker games were commonplace everywhere, and in some communities people engaged in shooting “craps” – a form of gambling using dice. Although many of these gambling activities were illegal, law enforcement placed very low priority on raiding illegal off-track bookie operations, or the “poor man’s lottery,” the numbers rackets, or Saturday evening poker games played for money usually occurring between friends and for relatively small amounts of money.

Then there were the full-on legal casino gambling venues which were limited to Nevada, Atlantic City, New Jersey and cruise lines and riverboats, where the full range of gambling games were allowed. These included slot machines, roulette, craps, blackjack and other house-banked card games pitting the gamblers playing those games against the house and not each other.

As attitudes toward gambling changed and more and more people saw these many forms of gambling as harmless, state and local governments took a second look at their laws strictly prohibiting most gambling games. Soon many states had state-run lotteries and allowed poker rooms or card clubs and even legalized off-track betting on horse races. Taking it a step further, many states allowed charitable groups to hold Bingo games for money, but licensed them and limited the amounts of money one could play and win and the hours and conditions of operation.

Meanwhile, the federal government had been trying for decades to find a way for the real historic Indian tribes to become self-sufficient and sustainable and doing so without eliminating the Indian tribal reservation system, which for decades had blocked the integration of Indians into mainstream America, particularly the mainstream of American economy.

Many tribes and particularly tribal governments resisted any change or attempts at assimilation, which they considered a threat to their tribe’s cultural preservation and a threat to the fiction that Indian tribes and their governments were “sovereign nations” notwithstanding the nearly total dependency of most tribes on the federal government.

Many of the 600 or so recognized tribes had only a handful of members and little land base. As Tim Giago, a noted Lakota Sioux writer, once wrote in an editorial, “Indians don’t need more welfare, they need a welfare to work program.”

Congress passed many laws in the struggle to improve a lot of reservation Indians and eliminate the massive bureaucracy that had been established, called the Bureau of Indian Affairs (B.I.A.), and its even bigger parent, the Department of Interior (D.O.I.).

Congress was loathe to eliminate the inherent separation and isolation created by the tribal reservation system. In most cases these federal laws and programs were ineffective. The real historic tribes of Indians often saw those assimilation efforts as an attempt to extinguish their respective cultures or impinge on what they considered to be a “sovereign status.”

Beginning during the late 1970s and early 1980s, Indian tribes in Florida and other states began offering Bingo for money as a tribal business and method of earning money.

Not long after those efforts began the tiny Cabazon Indian tribe located near Palm Springs asserted the right to offer Bingo games for money, and without any limitation on the amounts of money, conditions and hours of operation that applied to groups under California charitable Bingo laws. They also wanted to open a card club like those being operated under State and local licensing, but without the regulations imposed by the California Gambling Control Board and local jurisdictions. California refused to allow these Bingo games and card clubs, because the State feared it could not control such activities when it was occurring on Indian reservation lands.

A lawsuit entitled Cabazon Tribe v. California (Governor Wilson) was commenced and finally wound its way through the system and wound up before the United States Supreme Court in 1987. In that case, the U.S. Supreme Court divided California gambling games into two groups: Those games that were illegal and prohibited by everyone, everywhere in the state and those that were permitted like charitable Bingo, horse racing and card clubs. The court concluded that Indian tribes in California were entitled to operate Bingo, card games and other forms of gambling that were permitted to other non-Indians within the state.

They further concluded that because Indian tribes had historically been accorded a measure of self-government and control of their governmental affairs on their reservation lands, then when operating these permitted games they could regulate these games on their own – setting the rules and limits of play for themselves and need not follow California’s limitations.

On the other hand, the Court made it clear all gambling games that were prohibited to everyone within the State of California as a matter of strong public policy were likewise prohibited on any Indian reservations within the borders of California.

This was a fairly straightforward decision; however, it was poorly understood by many state and local governments all over the country, many of which thought this decision would open the floodgates of gambling in their respective states.

Consequently Congress moved quickly in what they thought would clarify the Cabazon case, and in October 1988 they enacted the Indian Gaming and Regulatory Act [the IGRA] 25 USC 2701 et.seq.

This Act divided Indian Gambling games into three groups: Class I was any traditional Indian games played amongst tribal members. Class II was Bingo or similar traditional games played on a card by marking a number of letters as they were randomly selected and called out or posted. These games were licensed and regulated by the National Indian Gaming Commission also created by the I.G.R.A. Class III gaming was the full-on casino style gambling like slot machines, “craps,” roulette, blackjack and other “house-banked” games where the players are playing against the house and not against each other. To be entitled to engage in Class III gambling games, the Indian tribe must have a tribal-state compact approved by the state and lawfully in effect under state law. As it later turned out, this federal law created more problems than it resolved.

Next time: The Indian Gaming and Regulatory Act, an example of a well-intended law gone awry.

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Account(in)ability

Aug 20

Posted by Malia Hill in Commentary | Comments off

Imagine for a moment that you had a few thousand dollars in loose change and bills behind the cushions of your couch, in your old jacket pockets, a spare wallet or two, and spread out through a few pairs of pants.  How big a jerk would you be in this situation if you then went to your best friend, told him you were totally broke, and asked to him to give you money to pay your rent?  If you answered, “No more a jerk than your average local politician,” you win.  Congratulations!  You truly understand the nature of Hawaii politics.

According to a recent report from the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii, the state has more that $1.4 billion in unspent excess funds sitting in “special funds” accounts–several of which have long been noted by the state auditor for repeal.  What is a “special fund”?  In short, it’s a little niche set-aside of state money for some specific purpose–say, public art education–funded through anything from state license fees to legislative appropriations.  You may recall that the 2009 Legislative Session included a finance bill that gave the Hawaii director finance authority to “raid” these special funds if necessary to pay government expenses.  This, not unnaturally, got some of us wondering exactly how much money there was available in these state special funds.  In light of the nearly relentless efforts to raise taxes and raid our wallets, the knowledge that there are untold millions of state dollars sitting around in untouched “special funds” is just a wee bit infuriating.

Thus, the Grassroot Institute launched its own investigation into the extent of Hawaii’s “special funds”.  You can read the full report here, but some highlights include:

  • In a review of 20 State Department reports, they found 186 accounts identified as special funds.
  • This accounts amounted to a combined excess balance of $1,412,357,203.
  • Divided equally among the population of Hawaii, these combined excess balances have a refund value of $1090.47.
  • The Hawaii Department of Transportation was the worst offender, with $582,449,161 reported as unspent, while the Hawaii Health Systems Corporation had the smallest excess at $34,837.

Really, how outrageous is the situation when the smallest, most responsible excess is still more money that many Hawaiians make in a year?  An economist once pointed out that there are four ways to spend money: 1. You can spend your own money on yourself, in which case you look for the best possible value in quality and price; 2. You spend other people’s money on yourself, in which case you look for the best quality and damn the price; or 3. You spend your money on other people, and look for the best value in terms of price and might compromise on value; and 4. You spend other people’s money on other people, and to heck with quality, value, price, or anything other than getting home from work a little earlier than usual.  Most government spending–especially as practiced in Hawaii–falls into Category 4.  We get nothing but sob stories from every possible state representative about lack of revenue.  We get tax increases and “Furlough Fridays” and guilt trips about the plight of government workers.  And all this time, they’ve been hoarding funds to the tune of $1.4 billion.  It boggles the mind.

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Akaka bill maneuvers coming up from September through December 2010

Aug 17

Posted by Ken Conklin in Uncategorized | Comments off

The flight path of the Akaka bill now in the Senate has an eerie resemblance to what happened in previous years. “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” (George Santayana). Will the Akaka bill pass or fail? In either case, will the end come with a bang or a whimper? Let’s review the whimper of Senate stealth maneuvers in 2000 and 2001, and the bang of the cloture motion on the Senate floor in 2006, to compare them with what’s been happening during the past year and what’s plausible for the upcoming period of September through December, 2010.

If we work hard and are lucky the bill will either die lonely, and quietly forgotten, as happened in 2000; or will crash and burn spectacularly as happened in 2006. But this will be the period of greatest danger in ten years …

For the complete article, see
http://www.hawaiipoliticalinfo.org/node/3245

That’s “Entertainment”?

Aug 13

Posted by Malia Hill in Commentary, Office of Hawaiian Affairs | Comments off

So, how often do you like to kick back and watch a little Pacific Network Internet television?  Yeah, me neither.

But would you make more of an effort if you knew that they were getting nearly a million dollars from OHA for the creation of a “Hawaiian-themed internet television station and web portal”?  It kinda makes you wonder what a cool million buys these days in the way of internet entertainment . . . aside from buckets of Farmville cash or enough “adult videos” to end up under permanent FBI surveillance, of course.

Curious as to what a Hawaiian internet TV station might look like, I checked out their website, and was confronted by . . . Puppies!  Adorable ones! In a shopping cart!  Also, canoeing wipe-outs and some footage of a party in Waikiki that didn’t seem interesting enough to click on.  In all honesty, it looked more like a creation of the Hawaii Tourism Authority than anything intended for Hawaii residents, much less Native Hawaiians.  And if this were a private enterprise, that would be no big deal.  I mean, I would question their business plan, but we live in a country where people are entitled to waste their own money in whatever way they wish.  And I would no more stop someone from starting a questionable business enterprise than from going to an Rob Schneider movie.  (Ok, that’s not entirely true.  I would probably at least try to urge them, out of basic human decency, to avoid the movie.)  But this is beside the point.  Because we’re not talking about private enterprise here.  We’re talking about money intended for the benefit of the Native Hawaiian people.  And we’re talking about a quasi-governmental agency that hopes to have a big hand in the proposed Native Hawaiian Reorganization proposed by the Akaka Bill.

The crazy thing is that we have seen plenty of media enterprises aimed at speaking primarily to one minority group succeed (BET and Telemundo come to mind, but there are others too).  But they succeed or fail in the marketplace by learning to speak to their audience and growing their audience in a profitable way.  Who is the Pacific Network speaking to?  The lack of advertising on the website suggests that profitability at this point is determined only by the success of their grant proposals.  If you were (or are) Native Hawaiian, would you consider this an effective way of reaching out or fostering the Native Hawaiian community?  Or is it just another OHA vanity grant that looks good on paper, but disappoints in reality?

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More on the Akaka Petition

Aug 8

Posted by Malia Hill in Commentary | Comments off

It’s always dumbfounding to me how the pro-Akaka Bill crowd is always trying to place a clumsy thumb on the scale of public opinion.  If you didn’t know where to look, you’d think that Hawaii was largely in favor of the bill (rather than sharply divided over it).  Moreover, you’d be convinced that every single Native Hawaiian in the state was clamoring for its passage.  That’s certainly how it must look sometimes to the Washington beltway crowd.  (Who, let’s face it, have a long history of swinging back and forth between romanticizing the Aloha state and then totally disregarding it.)  The good news (and I do have some) is that there are groups out there (including groups of Native Hawaiians) who are opposed to the Akaka Bill and are working to let Washington know that there are more voices out here than those of the vote-counting politicians and OHA.  Not long ago, I posted a link to an online petition demanding public hearings on the Akaka Bill in Hawaii.  Well here, in its entirety, is the letter sent from Leon Siu (head of the Keoni Foundation, a coalition of Native Hawaiian groups) to every U.S. Senator, citing that very petition in a request that Senators vote against the Bill.  Enjoy:

HAWAIIANS DEMAND AKAKA BILL HEARINGS IN HAWAI`I
Petition Shows Broad Anti-Akaka Bill Sentiment

Aloha,

We are contacting you to make you aware of broad opposition to S.1011, the Native Hawaiian Government Reorganization Act of 2009, otherwise known as the Akaka bill, throughout Hawai`i and to ask for your vote AGAINST this bill.

Regardless of what Hawai`i Senators Akaka and Inouye have told your office, the people of Hawai`i, including Native Hawaiians, do not support the Akaka bill and are demanding public hearings be held in Hawai`i before any vote occurs in Congress.

Over the years, poll after poll has shown the citizens of Hawai`i, both native and non-native to be overwhelmingly opposed to this bill.

Moreover an online anti-Akaka bill petition has garnered hundreds of signers from all political points of view, both of natives and non-natives.

A copy, with over eight hundred signatures is attached to this email. The petition can also be seen online at http://StopAkakaPetition.com <http://StopAkakaPetition.com>

“We, the people of Hawai`i, declare our opposition to the 2010 version of the Akaka bill, and strongly object to being excluded from this legislative process,” stated Leon Siu representing the Koani Foundation, part of a coalition of Native Hawaiian groups.

“We have long been told that open, public debates in matters that affect the citizenry are part of the US democratic process. But it has not been so with the Akaka bill.”

“We, the people of Hawai`i, insist the US Senate Indian Affairs Committee hold public hearings on S.1011 in Hawai`i as soon as possible. We demand to be heard.”

The only time public hearings were held in Hawai`i on the bill was ten years ago.

At that hearing, people turned out in record numbers to oppose the legislation.

Since then, the only hearings held on the Akaka bill were in Washington, DC in the dead of winter, 5,000 miles from Hawai`i, and no opposing testimony from Hawaiians or anyone else was allowed.

For more information, contact Leon Siu at (808) 488-4669.

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Death and . . . well, you know

Aug 3

Posted by Malia Hill in Commentary, News | Comments off

So, who do you think pays the most in state taxes in the US?  New Yorkers?  That would have been my guess, simply based on how legendarily expensive it is.  (Not to mention how bad a beating my wallet takes every time I go there.  Ok, technically speaking, the nice restaurants shouldn’t count as a New York tax–it’s really more of a tax on me for not living in NYC.)  So then, if not New York, maybe Massachusetts?  Don’t they call it “The People’s Republic of Massachusetts”?  If a strong tradition of Northeastern liberalism doesn’t result in a hefty tax bill, then nothing will.

Yes, New York and Massachusetts both make the top 5.  But for a sheer, soul-crushing, burdensome tax scheme, no other state can beat Hawaii.  That’s right.  We’re #1! We’re #1!  I quote the San Francisco Chronicle’s recent article on the states with the greatest individual tax burden on their residents:

  • Hawaii
    The Aloha State may be renowned as one of the most beautiful states in the Union, but that beauty comes at significant cost: the average Hawaiian paid out $1,010 in state taxes in the first quarter of the year, the highest of any state. The two biggest components to the state’s revenues were income and excise taxes.

    Unlike many other states, Hawaii doesn’t have a sales tax – instead, Hawaiians pay gross receipts (or excise) taxes on each of their purchases. That means that items like rent, medical bills and food are all taxable purchases in Hawaii, unlike other states with traditional sales tax. That also means that tax-exempt non-profits have to pay out Hawaii’s excise tax regardless of their status in other states. (Real estate costs in Hawaii are also high. Read more, in Simple Ways To Save In Retirement.)

    Read more:

    http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2010/07/21/investopedia45833.DTL#ixzz0uuya68km

    How bad is it when San Francisco feels sorry for you?  Damn. (In case you’re wondering, rounding out the top 5 are Connecticut, New York, Minnesota, and Massachusetts.  A small, mean part of me feels that higher taxes are no less than those residents deserve for having the Patriots, Red Sox, Yankees, Giants, Jets, and Vikings between them.  Hawaii’s number one and doesn’t have so much as a professional soccer team to its credit.  How’s that fair? )
    So could you use an extra couple of thousand dollars a year?  (Double for couples where you both work.)  Because this is where our decades of high-tax/high-spend policies have landed us.  With an individual tax burden higher than any other state in the US.  Personally, I think it’s time we start asking our legislative and gubernatorial candidates some hard questions about their tax policies.

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    Organizing Against Reorganization

    Jul 27

    Posted by Malia Hill in Commentary | Comments off

    I am not a Native Hawaiian, nor do I play one on TV.  But, let’s say for the sake of argument that there was a proposal to create a new tribal government for us Hapa Filipinos.  There’s one or two of us in the islands, right?  And now, let’s say that there was a substantial trust and land value tied up in the issue.  (I know, I know.  This part may be hard to imagine, given that many of us have grandfathers who consider the family trust to exist in a coffee can in the sock drawer, but this is a hypothetical exercise.  I have a point, after all–I’m just kinda slow getting there.)  Anyway, being that I’ve never been in a room of more than two Filipino women who didn’t have an opinion on anything from the quality of the homily at church on Sunday to the proper way to make lumpia, I have trouble imagining that there wouldn’t be a strong push for public comment on the proposed Filipino reorganization.

    So I find it hard to understand why we haven’t had opportunity for comment on the Akaka Bill yet.  This is the most transformative piece of legislation to hit Hawaii since we became a state.  (Heck, some people might say since the revolution.)  And yet, there’s no push for public hearings on it?  Well–let’s be fair here.  There certainly is a push for public hearings on the part of the public.  Strangely, the politicians involved seem to be more interested in keeping all the wheeling, dealing, and negotiations at a more exclusive level.  And if that’s not enough of an argument for hearings, I don’t know what is.

    Therefore, even though I’m not the world’s biggest fan of online petitions (No, I am not going to stop watching TV today in order to send a message to Big Oil.  Burn Notice is on tonight, for goodness sakes!), I think that this one is a worthy one.  It’s a call to stop the Akaka Bill until the people of Hawaii (as well as Native Hawaiians in other parts of the country) get their opportunity to weigh in on the matter.  So click on this link and make your voice heard in the fight to  . . . um . . . make your voice heard.

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    Promises, (Com)promises

    Jul 22

    Posted by Malia Hill in Commentary | Comments off

    It is, I confess, too easy to mock and criticize politicians.  Maybe it’s the endless weighing of polls and legacies and that finger held constantly to the wind.  Or maybe it’s the obfuscations, the justifications, and the ill-considered legislation.  But politicians do have to think about a lot of things that most of us never bother about.  I mean, do you have any idea how much time they spend fretting over what tie will make them look like a leader of people without conveying a privileged, upper-crust background?  It’s why they all go grey so quickly.

    All of this to explain why Gov. Linda Lingle was in a pickle.  Supporting the Akaka Bill gets her grudging accolades from various normally critical groups and looks great on the ol’ legacy meter.  Opposing it . . . doesn’t really do much, politically speaking, except get her the temporary approval of those who secretly think that she’s an unreliable ally.

    Oops.  Guess who was right?

    As you may have heard, Lingle reversed her previous opposition to the Akaka Bill in a dramatic and widely-trumpted press release and letter to the Senate, explaining at length why she’s totally hunky-dory with the most radical piece of legislation ever to transform an entire state’s culture.  To be fair, I thought that Lingle’s reservations–primarily concerning whether members/leaders of the new Native Hawaiian government would be immune from certain Hawaiian laws–were valid.  And yes, it’s a good thing that they’ve been resolved.  Sort of.

    But let’s not pretend that everything is better now.  Notably, one of Lingle’s reservations was not, “will this have enormous unforseen consequences for the economic and social health of my state.”  (See above rant about the concerns of politicians.)

    Here’s the part that really gets me about the letter though–the hubris that seems to suggest that now that our illustrious Governor is on board, there’s nothing left to say on that matter.  Au contraire.  I have a lot to say.  Like, “It’s totally disingenuous of the Governor to say in her letter to the Senate that the Akaka Bill just brings Hawaii into line with the other US states that recognize Indian tribes.  This is a completely new and different situation–not the recognition of a tribe, but the creation of one out of a racially mixed former country.”  And, “Just saying that the Bill is constitutional doesn’t make it true.  There are a lot of people hoping to sue the U.S. if this is passed and use the unconstitutionality of Akaka to test other civil rights issues.”

    Regardless of what Gov. Lingle’s press office claims, her approval hasn’t solved anything for those of us who truly understand the problems with Akaka.

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