Fervidly held, passionately believed, sincerely promoted and strongly felt provincial cultural beliefs have always been forced to yield to discovered and substantiated truths about reality, truths which are not provincial but universal.

For believers whose cultural identity is limited to the minute bit comprising their immediate ancestry, this can seem threatening. Beliefs about sacred sites, ceremonial shrines and dwelling places of imagined gods, spirits and departed ancestors may have been defensible perspectives during periods when factual knowledge was scant, but they are not rationally defensible today.

Today we face a choice: promoting the search for factual knowledge via a telescope of unprecedented capability, or promoting willful ignorance by clinging to myth (“Telescope hearings end on Big Isle after 44 days,” Star-Advertiser, March 4).

Kenneth F. Nelson

Palolo Valley

—

Trump is unfit to be president

I hope more and more Americans are coming to see how emotionally unhinged and mentally disturbed is President Donald Trump.

He’s admitted grabbing women’s private parts, and walking into the dressing rooms of teenage girls. He saw crowds of people who never attended his inauguration. He saw crowds of Muslims cheering in New Jersey for the destruction of the World Trade Center towers (that no one else ever saw).

Now he claims he was wiretapped by President Barack Obama (with no evidence). The man doesn’t have a clue about being presidential. He tweets like a teenager, and his greatest accomplishment has been reading from a Teleprompter for an hour-long speech. Even a third-grader can read a book report aloud in class.

Trump is a stain on America. One shudders at how much damage he can do to this country.

David Weiss

Kaimuki

—

Voices heard in Washington, D.C.

The women’s marches in the U.S and around the world;

The large attendance at town-hall meetings;

The marches against that first travel ban;

The courts that help with our checks and balances;

Our freedom of the press;

All your voices heard around the nation and the world:

All your efforts bore some early fruit.

President Donald Trump delivered a non-ranting-and-raving speech, 40 days into his first 100 days.

Joyce Matsuo

Kalihi

—

Rail should end at Middle Street

Nary a day goes by without opinions about the cost or feasibility of Oahu’s rail transit project.

In the same edition appeared Lee Cataluna’s column (“Street-level rail sounds good, then reality hits,” Star-Advertiser, Feb. 8) and Krishniah Murthy’s commentary (“At-grade rail won’t work for Oahu,” Star-Advertiser, Island Voices, Feb. 8), together with two more letters to the editor on the subject.

I would offer a different suggestion to John Brizdle’s letter, (“First answer hard questions about rail,” Star-Advertiser, Feb. 7): Please stop the useless waste of our taxes. Stop the rail at Middle Street.

Richard I. Morrill

McCully-Moiliili

—

Raise hotel room tax if necessary

Instead of beating down all the working folks with increased property, rail, gas, retail and vehicle taxes, I think it’s time for legislators to consider charging higher hotel room taxes. It’s time for visitors, like the rest of us, to pay more to enjoy overcrowded paradise. Most residents making $50,000 per year or less are living from paycheck to paycheck. It’s never going to get less expensive.

The tourism industry is flourishing. Hotel rooms are full. Opponents say taxing tourists will hurt the industry and economy. People who pay $300 to $1,000 a night might care if the room taxes are higher, but they will still come. Hawaii is a premium location. Other states tax us when we travel. This should be considered seriously. We don’t have a choice. The money has to come from somewhere.

Bill Romerhaus

Haleiwa

—

Suicide not part of human dignity

All we as a society need is another decision that gives legal permission to kill a human being. We already give legality to the killing of the unborn when we know it is undeniably a living person. To give legal permission to take our own lives using the assistance of the medical profession further downgrades our humanity as well as the medical profession.

We have an obligation to protect the living person; doctors already agree to this when they become doctors. It is contrary to our trust in the medical profession to give it even the slightest notion that it’s OK to help another take a life.

So much in society today slams and ignores the value of life: movies, TV, fiction. Please, those in decision- making roles, help society maintain what is left of human dignity by not giving our state approval of assisted suicide.

Bob Badham

Kailua