TMT escalation?
The state attorney general is seeking $1.2 million to prepare for responding to civil disobedience.
He identified the possible renewal of demonstrations on Maunakea, should the current appeals result in the state Supreme Court upholding the Board of Land and Natural Resources decision to grant the permit for the Thirty Meter Telescope.
The attorney general would be well-served to educate himself on what happened at Standing Rock in North Dakota.
Few people are aware that when the first opposition arose to the Dakota Access Pipeline, the Lakota people acted to protect their water by calling for prayers and songs. There is a video of Morton County sheriffs dancing with Lakota and non-Lakota “water protectors.” Then a private security firm brought out dogs and sicced them on water protectors. The visuals reminded people of Alabama’s Bull Connor bringing out dogs against peaceful protests during the civil rights movement.
The pipeline company then brought in private mercenaries, who first conducted a propaganda campaign to portray the peaceful and prayerful water protectors as an “ideologically driven insurgency with a strong religious component” and a “jihadist insurgency.” These quotes are from internal documents of TigerSwan, the lead mercenary organization.
The propaganda targeted the general public with false stories, infiltrated the water protectors to sew dissension and worked over time to convince law enforcement they faced potential terrorists.
As a result of the mercenary poisoning of the public dialogue and the minds of law enforcement personnel, North Dakota purchased $600,000 worth of military equipment, including “pepper spray, flash-bang and smoke grenades, riot helmets, gas masks, night-vision goggles, more than 2,000 rounds of non-lethal ammunition and more” (from The Bismark Tribune).
The private military/security contractors infiltrated spies into the water protector camps. Their internal documents revealed their overall goal was to “delegitimize the anti-DAPL movement.” The FBI placed informants, who encouraged people to carry weapons in the water protectors’ encampment.
Overall, the mercenaries succeeded in convincing law enforcement personnel to implement the “anti-terrorist” template that the mercenaries brought to North Dakota from the battlefields of Afghanistan and Iraq. The result was escalation into violence, predominantly on the part of law enforcement.
The opposition to the TMT observed kapu aloha to continuously avoid such escalation and maintain mutual respect between law enforcement and those protecting the mountain.
The attorney general should be careful he is not already attempting to escalate the TMT controversy.
Lanny Sinkin
Hilo
Folks, put this guy’s name into Google to see what he’s all about; include the quotes
“Lanny Sinkin”
He is spokesman for “King Silva” seeking to make Hawaii an independent nation. He previously was a socialist/Communist agitator for the Irish Republic Socialist Party, traveling to Moscow in 2015 to participate in an anti-capitalist, anti-globalization conference, accepting financial help from Muammar Gaddafi (dictator of Libya).
Sinkin is an anti-American propagandist who seeks to weaken our government by using leftwing propaganda to undermine our loyalty and promote anarchy. Let the facts sink in about Mr. Sinkin. He’s nothing more than a disreputable agitator just like the Russian commies who worked to undermine America in the 1950s.
Spot on. It only took 70 years for lefty subversives to infiltrate all levels of the private and public sectors and rot the USA from the inside out.
‘The attorney general should be careful he is not already attempting to escalate the TMT controversy’.
This is a veiled threat. They are already planning possible violence and laying down the ground work for who to blame. You better come up with a better solution than to ignore men like this.
Obviously Mr. Conklin does not approve of me. I am struck by the “financial help from Muammar Gaddafi” that I supposedly received for my trip to Russia in 2015. Gaddafi died in 2011. The rest of his screed is equally accurate. 🙂
TMT is nothing like DPL. To suggest that the State of Hawaii has a desire to escalate the TMT controversy, bring out attack dogs, and militarize its response to civil disobedience surrounding the issue is an absurd attempt to equate it to the Standing Rock protest.
DAPL is being built by a private oil company on land taken by eminent domain. TMT is being built in the existing Astronomy District of Maunakea, by a nonprofit international partnership of scientific and academic institutions that are investing in Hawaii’s economic and educational development, and supported by seed money from the Moore Foundation, a charitable organization known for its commitment to benefit the lives of indigenous people worldwide.
DAPL is hazardous to the environment and local water supply. TMT is not. In the last 50 years of astronomy on Maunakea, there has been zero proof of water contamination and far less environmental impact than ranching, tourism, invasive species, and the Pohakuloa Training Area.
DAPL is a massive project. TMT is tiny in comparison. DAPL covers over 1,100 miles, spans four states, and will transport half a million barrels of crude oil every day. The pipeline crosses wetlands, farms, and historic Native American sites. In contrast, TMT’s entire footprint of about 5 acres would fit inside the Hilo Walmart parking lot. The proposed TMT site is a reasonable distance from cultural preservation locations and almost a mile away from the nearest native burial grounds.
DAPL perpetuates dependency on fossil fuels. Which makes it a little ironic that space science research and development is the basis of new materials that make the next generation of solar panels possible. Many NASA spinoffs have led to cleaner tech and more efficient energy usage. TMT funding for STEM education in local schools may even help create the next generation of scientists who develop greener technology for the future.
DAPL is at odds with native culture and beliefs. Astronomy is a vital part of Hawaiian culture, heritage and spirit. Study of the stars, wayfinding, exploration and discovery are an integral part of Hawaiian values. Hawaii’s most visionary monarchs from Kamehameha I, King David Kalakaua and Queen Liliuokalani all recognized the cultural significance of astronomy and embraced modern technology. Today’s modern Hawaiians and all people around the world can track Hokulea’s voyage using GPS satellites.
DAPL is all about money. TMT is all about science. There’s a big difference between crude oil transportation and space exploration. New knowledge gained from the TMT project would benefit ALL people of Planet Earth.
Ms. Dahlby misses the point. While the DAPL and the TMT may be very different projects, both have generated significant public opposition. That opposition has brought citizen opponents and law enforcement into situations where there is a potential for violence, even though the opponents are committed to Kapu Aloha.
In the case of the DAPL, the private mercenaries encouraged law enforcement to think of themselves as on a “battlefield” fighting against jihadist terrorists. Law enforcement responded by spending tens of thousands of dollars militarizing the law enforcement personnel.
Eventually, the peaceful opposition and law enforcement relationship deteriorated into confrontation and violence. Most of the violence came from militarized law enforcement.
I wrote what I wrote as a cautionary tale discouraging the Attorney General from going down that same road. The nature of the two projects is irrelevant to that warning.
Ms. Dalby, Sankin clearly just cherry picked your argument and commented on what he thought was salvageable from his drivel. You are way out of your league here sankin.
I find it hilarious that Mr. Sinkin considers himself a voice for anything Hawaiian. All during the Contested Case Hearing he pontificated about Hawaiian gods. Let’s not forget he got on that racist diatribe train that said Hawaiians who supported the Thirty Meter Telescope were not Hawaiian. Now Mr. Sinkin makes a connection between the DAPL and TMT. Telescopes are not oil conduits, clearly he ignores the fact that TMT will be a 0 waste facility. DAPL does not increase mankind’s knowledge of the universe. But TMT will do that and our kupuna were advocates of seeking knowledge. DAPL does not support education of Native American tribes but TMT is educating keiki with the Think Fund, Akamai Workforce Initiative and class room grants. Last but not least, let’s not over look the fact that Hawaii is a state, in fact it is the 50th State. Yes. There is no doubt that Queen Liliuokalani lost her throne to the greedy folks who hand their hands in the till and were trying to set up a caste system that would forever fund their need for cheap labor. But the cheap labor, those who were being exploited, out maneuvered the Big Five by voting for statehood. There were fears of reprisals for families like mine, my relatives were still working on the plantations. But they were brave and decided to take destiny into their own hands. Mr. Sinkin is afraid that the growing support for TMT will eclipse him and his performance during those many months of the Contested Case Hearing. Somehow he doesn’t have the appeal of Mr. and Mrs. Freitas, or Ku Ching, and charming Ms. Piscotta, the true leaders of the movement against TMT. Even though there is disagreement over the TMT the words from these people ring true and we can feel them in our hearts. And everyone can see that a telescope is not an oil pipeline. As our AG continues to fight against the Trump Administration’s overtly racist policies I am reminded of my family’s struggles against the Big Five. Hawaii has come a long way, over come many obstacles and it is important for us to remember that the journey that brought us to these shores began with an astronomer who had the knowledge and the courage to explore.
Sankin is a Hack. The stories told about him back in the 80’s in Hawaiian Acres would lead one to believe that he is insane. Worshiping dolphins and they speak back to him. Hack and a Joke at best.
Hmm, we can listen to the advice of the state attorney general, or the paleface self-appointed chief kahuna of “The Temple of Lono”, a mysterious quasi-religion that, if it really existed at all, by kingdom rights should have been outlawed in 1819 after The Battle of Kuamo’o, a litigious wrench thrower. This guy dives me a throbbing cognitive dissonance headache.
We Hawaiians can share a very small part of our largest mountain in the world,
especially for as noble a purpose as expanding human understanding of the universe by the TMT.
That’s true aloha.
It’s called the BIG Island for a reason.
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