Volcanic Ash

I encouraged the Hannemann campaign to address issues arising from the state Democratic convention and wanted to direct attention to a detailed comment on the previous post, “More Mufi in the woodshed,” from Keith Rollman.

Rollman, a senior city IT advisor, Hannemann campaign volunteer and Democratic convention delegate, argues that the convention was stacked from the start by supporters of Hannemann’s major Democratic rival for governor, Neil Abercrombie. Part of his comment:

There is little tollerance for any “Democrat” not willing to tow the liberal mantra of the Neil Abercrombie zealots who have taken over the party. What used to be the “big tent” is now a rather ingrown clique with some very radical views. I don’t think they represent the more patriotic AJA Democrats I know, the typical union workers or a majority of the more moderate and independent individuals who still consider themselves Democrats. To quote an old adage…we didn’t leave the party, the party left us.

You can read Rollman’s entire comment and enter your own at the above link. I’m closing this post to comments to keep all responses on the matter together over there.

Feel free to debate the substance vigorously, but please avoid personal insults. I’d like everybody who posts here to be treated with personal courtesy, and feel especially strongly about it for those who put their real names behind their comments.

I don’t know how many read all the way through yesterday’s comments about Mayor Mufi Hannemann’s performance at the state Democratic Convention, but there was one near the end from Laraine Yasui, co-chair of the convention planning committee, that’s worth a look.

Yasui basically confirms party chairman Dante Carpenter’s assertions about the behavior of the mayor and his gubernatorial campaign (see “Democratic chief takes Mufi to the woodshed”) and offers further details.

It’s extraordinary for party leaders to become incensed enough to publicly criticize so prominent a member. Following is the gist of her comment, which she also sent in an e-mail circulating among Democrats:

I know that no one from the party headquarters gave Dante’s letter to David. Also, I can vouch for the fact that Mufi’s campaign appeared to sabotage the convention events during the entire planning period. In addition to everything listed by Dante in his letter to Mufi, we lost thousands of dollars guaranteed to the hotel for food and beverage when Mufi offered delegates a free Friday reception and a free Saturday luncheon (we always have a Friday reception and a Saturday luncheon, which delegates pay for) causing our normal numbers of 400-500 for each event to drop to 200. I do not understand why he had to plan his reception on Friday night at the same time as committee meetings, when he could have done his party on Saturday night along with all other candidates, who hosted parties in their hotel suites. On Friday night, not only was Mufi’s party at the same time as the committee meetings, but right next to the meeting rooms, causing noise problems for the meetings with the loud music.

On Saturday, both Gubernatorial candidates were given 5 minutes to speak, and Neil spoke for 6 minutes and Mufi spoke for 12 minutes, ignoring Dante’s 3 warnings to stop. (The newspaper reported that Neal spoke for 10 minutes and Mufi spoke for 20 minutes, which was not correct.) 3 of Mufi’s campaign leaders specifically told me that we should suspend our business just so Mufi could speak at 3 pm. But the written agreement with Party Headquarters was that he could speak only after convention business was over, which was not finished at 3 pm.

I’m not active in any political party and wouldn’t try to pass myself off as the Emily Post of party etiquette, but the allegations against the Hannemann campaign would appear to be fairly serious breaches of good manners in any social setting.

It’s like a rich uncle showing up to your backyard family reunion and taking half the relatives you’d hoped would contribute to the potluck off to Ruth’s Chris.

If somebody from the Hannemann campaign would like to weigh in on this, with a name attached so I can verify it’s from from the campaign, I’ll see that it gets prominent display.

Note: With all the differing accounts of who spoke for how long, I sucked it up and reviewed the two speeches myself from the videos at HawaiiReporter.com and concluded that Democrats really have cheap watches. My count of the speech lengths from first word to last:

Hannemann: 17 minutes, 30 seconds

Abercrombie: 11 minutes, 10 seconds

The disparaged newspaper estimate wasn’t that far off. Carpenter wasn’t in the picture on these videos and I can’t speak to whether he signaled either candidate.