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Dealing with Manchin

Sen. Joe Manchin III is floating yet another idea to salvage the Build Back Better package. The Democrat from West Virginia wants to hike taxes on the rich and some corporations and then split the money between debt reduction and addressing climate change. In other words, he wants a smaller package than the $1.75 trillion deal Democratic leaders tried to make happen last year. Notice he also doesn’t mention President Biden’s key social priorities: universal pre-kindergarten, expanded child care and at least another year of the child tax credit. It’s understandable why many of his ...

Biden missed the moment

President Biden is no Olaf Scholz. The new Chancellor upended decades of center-left German defense and energy policy this week after Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine, and Mr. Biden had a similar opportunity in his State of the Union address on March 1. He missed the moment. The President remained on the same policy course of his first year, albeit dressed up in new anti-inflation packaging. More defense spending to meet the threats from autocrats? No. A new appreciation for the contribution of fossil fuels to American and European security? Not a word. A note that government spending ...

Will world act on climate?

Anew United Nations report blares dire warnings of the escalating effects of climate change: Our planet is no longer on the brink of catastrophe; the catastrophe is well underway. How we respond now will determine how horrific things get for nature and humanity. In a sweeping assessment released Monday by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, scientists from across the globe found that climate change is causing “dangerous and widespread disruption” to billions of people and the natural world. These effects are coming faster and harder than expected, outpacing our efforts ...

‘Stand your ground’ flawed

The disagreements start over the most mundane of matters. An argument over someone texting in a movie theater; a customer at the checkout in a grocery store being jostled; a driver getting cut off by another car. But then someone pulls a gun and what could have — should have — been resolved with a little calm, and some plain common sense, ends in needless tragedy. Fueling the spiraling escalation of violence that has made the United States a global outlier in gun violence are laws that give license to people to shoot first. “Stand your ground” laws, which allow individuals to ...

Inflation must be controlled

It is often said that when America sneezes, the world catches a cold. That saying tends to refer to other countries following its lead, but when it comes to changes in the United States’ monetary policy one can understand it in a different sense, since the spillover effects can significantly affect the economic well-being of other countries, especially the emerging economies, by disrupting their stock markets, asset valuations and capital flows. With the US Federal Reserve suggesting recently that it will hike interest rates “more aggressively” — possibly up to five times this ...

Getting ahead of the traffic

News that the Honua‘ula master-planned community in South Maui may be nearing approval after more than 30 years of opposition and legal challenges has us thinking about the impacts a development that size will have on traffic along Kihei’s entire north-south corridor. If approved, the addition of 1,150 housing units is sure to add vehicles to roads from Wailea Alanui Drive to Maui Veterans Highway. Not only will there be new residents, but also considerable construction and service traffic. Smaller developments are already ongoing in Makena and Wailea, and others are on the ...