Barbed wire won’t solve border issues

May 23, 2023

Any reforms must address the root causes driving migrants to flee their homes in the first place. The federal government spends $25 billion each year to police the border with Mexico. Yet, Gov. Greg Abbott thinks Texas taxpayers should spend upwards of $10 billion more so he can maintain his own massive police presence there. In 2022, the federal government made two million immigration arrests and confiscated more than 16,000 pounds of fentanyl at the border, triple the amount of the deadly drug seized in 2020. Yet, Abbott falsely claims the border is wide open while absurdly accusing ...

Taming tourism

May 20, 2023

Former Maui County Mayor Elmer Cravalho had a hopeful vision for this island’s burgeoning visitor industry back in the 1960s and 70s.  Maui would market itself to well-heeled travelers. It would also entice investors to build first-rate hotels and resorts. With their restaurants, pools, golf courses and tennis courts, these properties would accommodate a visitor’s every need. Guests would be comfortably corralled where they would have minimal impact on the island’s infrastructure. The selling points were jobs and economic growth. Maui needed an industry it could count on ...

Consequences for Trump

May 19, 2023

A 79-year-old advice columnist — along with a handful of other brave women who testified in her case — has done what legal and political institutions have not yet managed: held the former president Donald Trump accountable in law for his actions, and for his lies. In finding that he sexually abused E Jean Carroll in the 1990s, and subsequently defamed her, albeit not finding him liable for rape, the jury in her civil suit laid down an important marker. Though it awarded $5 million to Ms. Carroll, money cannot erase the initial attack, the intrusive memories she has endured or her ...

Biden and the banks

May 16, 2023

Regional banks took another market drubbing last month, as the financial panic rolls on despite regulatory assurances that all is well. The turmoil wasn’t helped when midsize TD Bank and First Horizon Bank called off their merger, blaming regulatory impediments. The merger cancellation followed the Biden Administration’s decision on May 1st to give JPMorgan a sweetheart deal to acquire failed First Republic Bank. It’s good to be a really, really big bank these days. Memphis-based First Horizon and TD announced their $13.4 billion tie-up in February 2022, long before turmoil ...

Maui Fair just a memory

May 13, 2023

It was a Sunday afternoon at the Maui Fair when the father pulled the last bill from his wallet and asked his two kids what they would like for the day’s final splurge. “Candied apples” came the reply. Sundays at the fair offered discount rides and smaller crowds. If the Joy Zone lost some its pizzazz in the light of day, the kids didn’t seem to notice. Their sticky apples were purchased and they hadn’t gone three steps before the younger boy stumbled and fell. After four days of heavy foot traffic, the ground at War Memorial Complex was a mix of torn-up grass and sandy dust. ...

Saudi Arabia rehabilitation

May 12, 2023

The journalist Jamal Khashoggi was murdered and dismembered in the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul in October 2018. The CIA subsequently concluded that this was ordered by the kingdom’s crown prince and de facto ruler, Mohammed bin Salman, though he denies it. The murder was so high-profile, and the details so horrifying, that concern about optics prevailed even where moral qualms were not a priority. Prominent business figures dropped out of a glitzy investment conference dubbed “Davos in the desert.” Joe Biden, then running to be the Democrats’ presidential candidate, said ...