Does the money really matter? Maybe.
One thing about Hawaiʻi politics is that it is notoriously devoid of one of the things that drives political coverage almost everywhere else: polling. Sure, there is the occasional poll published by the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, including one that measures the sitting governor's popularity. And, after next month's primary election, we will probably see polling that tells us who is ahead in the race for governor. But outside of those occasional ...
At 250, even Air Force One changes
With the 250th birthday of the United States of America, this blogger has chosen to celebrate by writing about a side passion of his – aviation. And more to the subject, the ever-changing nature and look of the iconic planes that carry the President and other Very Important People of this nation’s government. This subject comes to the forefront as the United States Special Air Mission (SAM) fleet has placed ...
Is it a primary of ideas, or a support audit
Earlier this month, June 2026, the filing deadline for candidates running for political office closed. And with all the excitement of hearing who made the fight ticket at a boxing match, it went right down to the end to see who would be running for each office. With all the information out there on the candidates, this blogger noted that there seem to be many races in the primary with ...
Phase 3: Between a target letter and a takeoff
As readers of this blog have read before, the saga of what happened to Lt. Governor Sylvia Luke was broken up into three “phases”. You can read about Phase I here and Phase II here. The "Luke Saga" evolved over three phases, in which both changes in personnel in the Lt. Governor's office occurred, as well as changes regarding gubernatorial travel. PC: Sodacan (With elements from File:Hawaii-StateSeal.svg, uploaded by: Clindberg), ...
When outrage isn’t enough
Here is a question to the reader: What happens when the traditional systems that once moderated political behavior lose influence? (If you want to provide me with an answer, send me an email here, or post a response to this article in the Facebook “Politics Hawaii with Stan Fichtman” page) This question has been at the forefront of this blogger’s mind after two recent incidents involving public officials raised a ...
