The only trouble is that business as usual might not be such a sweet-smelling affair, either. In Hawai ' i, when you come right down to it, we've got more of the first kind of corruption than the second. Far more often, and far more insidiously, we suffer from the kind of public malfeasance that starts at the bottom and worms its way through the whole system, like a swarm of ground termites taking on a single-wall construction home in Haiku Valley. We're so used to them, we don't even know anything is wrong until the house falls down upon us. State contracts are routinely awarded to those who make the biggest campaign contributions.
Politicians repeatedly sidestep the truth and use the law to justify it.
The trustees of our biggest private estate squander millions of dollars meant for the education of Hawaiian children before we finally get wise. Our elected officials vote time and again on measures affecting their own business interests without the smallest public outcry about conflict of interest. Either way, we, the little people, get pinched. I can stomach the type of corruption that Kahapea represents a lot more than the kind that is systemic. In the end, Michael Kahapea is little more than a common thief caught raiding the public coffers.