The Days Of Looking The Other Way…Are Over

Sunday December 15 at noon in Haleiwa – please be there and march with us.  If you live on Oahu especially, please make the time to join us and send a message loud and clear that the days of business as usual in Hawaii politics are over.

The excesses of the chemical companies, their development of genetically modified organisms and the negative impacts of this industry is the primary focus for many, however this issue is merely the most blatant and in your face example of how the pursuit of profits over people has taken over.

Whether it is GMO, Turtle Bay, minimum wage, or the high rise debacle in Kakaako, the common thread is a government that increasingly puts the interests of money over people.

I believe we have reached a tipping point.  Partly as a result of social media, partly as a result of a more informed and better educated populace, and partly a result of the sheer arrogance and excesses of industry – too many people are now aware of what is going on.

The days of looking the other way and pretending that we didn’t see are over.

Too many people are aware of the injustice that permeates so many parts of the world we live in.  Too many of us are either too old or too young to have the patience to put up with it any more.  We are tired of business as usual and we’ve grown weary of the mockery that has been made of our government.  The peoples’ house and institutions intended to protect the peoples’ interest have devolved into a system where the protection of profits and the rights of corporations takes precedence over the protection and the rights of people.

On Kauai we have learned to speak truth to power, with aloha – and we won.  We as a community challenged the power of the largest chemical companies in the world, and we won. Our request was minimal: Disclose to us what chemicals you are spraying in our community and don’t use them next to schools, hospitals and homes, yet they fought us every step of the way.

In Hawaii County, the same companies were challenged and again the people won.  On Maui the tide also is beginning to turn.

On Oahu the battle in the coming months will no doubt be waged at the state legislature.

Legislators in support of putting the protection of people and the environment first will attempt to implement statewide regulation of pesticides and genetically modified organisms’ while preserving the rights of local communities to pass even more stringent standards – creating a floor of new regulations and not a ceiling.  The chemical companies and their supporters in the legislature will be using all of their might to make sure that does not happen.

During the 2013 legislative session these companies supported SB727, a measure that literally proposed taking away the power of County government to protect health and life.

It is a given that all stops will be removed during the 2014 session and these companies and their friends will spend whatever it takes to buy the laws they need to buy in order to protect their profits.  .

Fortunately across our state people are waking up to their potential and to their responsibility.  The growing statewide network of community support and the willingness of people to actively engage in taking back control of their government has turned into a genuine movement.  2014 will be a test of sorts.

The potential for a tsunami of change is real and at our door step.  Please join us on Sunday and help send a message to all of Hawaii.  Business as usual is over, done, pau.