Hawaiʻi First

10/08/2026

The Finite World

On privilege, prayer, and what is worth counting I am fortunate. I have somehow been granted the privilege to live in more peace and solitude than most people other than monks and nuns. Itʻs not for everybody, but it works for me. It gives me time to think. With that privilege comes responsibility to use the time and perspective to examine what is important in life, and to propose what we can do to make it better for all of us, including the least of us: those who are suffering, and those who are forced to live in fear and deprivation....

On privilege, prayer, and what is worth counting I am fortunate. I have somehow been granted the privilege to live in more peace and solitude than most people other than monks and nuns. Itʻs not fo…

10/07/2026

Are You Better Off Today Than You Were Yesterday?

I'm not. I went to the grocery store. I've been thinking about the two parties, and about how much of what passes for politics now is just noise. The Republicans I grew up with disagreed with Democrats about plenty, but they shared enough common ground that the two sides could actually get something done. That's what people used to mean by bipartisanship....

I’m not. I went to the grocery store. I’ve been thinking about the two parties, and about how much of what passes for politics now is just noise. The Republicans I grew up with disagree…

10/06/2026

The Disease of Money

Limitlessness, Compound Interest, and the Suicidal Logic of Capital Every civilization has known greed, but greed is old, local, and self-limiting: a body can eat only so much. The disease of money is something else. Power and prestige can also be desired without end, but money gives that limitlessness a form that is countable, portable, and exchangeable for nearly anything. It has no use that satisfies and no body that spoils....

Limitlessness, Compound Interest, and the Suicidal Logic of Capital Every civilization has known greed, but greed is old, local, and self-limiting: a body can eat only so much. The disease of money…

09/29/2026

Wrong Enemy

On Hawaiʻi’s 2026 primary and the adversary neither party is willing to name Summary In 1897, Native Hawaiians signed petitions against annexation in overwhelming numbers. In the August 8, 2026 primary, only a third of Hawaiʻi’s registered voters returned a ballot: 281,214 of 846,543, or 33.2 percent, the second-lowest turnout since statehood. The essay argues that participation fell because the political arrangement changed, not because people became less capable of taking part....

On Hawaiʻi’s 2026 primary and the adversary neither party is willing to name Summary In 1897, Native Hawaiians signed petitions against annexation in overwhelming numbers. In the August 8, 2026 pri…

09/15/2026

Itʻs Our Money: The Puna Recovery Ledger

The Puna Recovery Ledger (DRAFT) can be downloaded at www.bodien.com/downloads. I built the first Puna Recovery Ledger as an audit workbook. It contains six working sheets: Dashboard, Executive Ledger, Road Contracts, DLNR Pohoiki, Round 3 Grants, Records Gaps, and Definitions. Every figure is classified as an appropriation, funding envelope, contract/award, explicit expenditure, or—in one narrowly defined case—an expenditure inferred from a reported outstanding contract balance....

http://hawaiifirst.blog/2026/09/15/it%ca%bbs-our-money-the-puna-recovery-ledger/

The Puna Recovery Ledger (DRAFT) can be downloaded at www.bodien.com/downloads. I built the first Puna Recovery Ledger as an audit workbook. It contains six working sheets: Dashboard, Executive Led…

09/15/2026

Itʻs Our Money: Approved Is Not Paid For – Hawaiʻi PUC and the $480 Million Question

On December 31, 2025, the Hawaiʻi Public Utilities Commission issued a 260-page order approving Hawaiian Electric’s 2025–2027 Wildfire Mitigation Plan.¹ The plan carries a price tag of roughly $480 million: covered conductors, vegetation clearing, asset inspections, weather stations, hazard cameras, a wildfire watch office. Almost every account of that decision described it as approval of a $480 million program. That is not quite what happened....

On December 31, 2025, the Hawaiʻi Public Utilities Commission issued a 260-page order approving Hawaiian Electric’s 2025–2027 Wildfire Mitigation Plan.¹ The plan carries a price tag of roughly $480…

09/15/2026

Itʻs Our Money: Why Nothing Moves

Three approvals, one program, and a bill nobody has paid yet Since storm Lala, I have been tracing disaster money in Hawaiʻi. The same theme keeps repeating. A large number gets announced. The number gets repeated. Months pass. Then more months. And when you go looking for the thing the number was supposed to buy, it is not there yet — and nobody in the chain has said anything false....

Three approvals, one program, and a bill nobody has paid yet Since storm Lala, I have been tracing disaster money in Hawaiʻi. The same theme keeps repeating. A large number gets announced. The numb…

09/15/2026

Itʻs Our Money: Puna After the 2018 Kīlauea Eruption

What Was Lost, What Was Funded, What Was Spent, What Was Built, and What Remains As Kaʻū, Nāʻalehu, Puna, and the surrounding communities begin rebuilding after Lala, there is a case worth studying that is closer to home than Lahaina and further along: the 2018 Kīlauea eruption, now eight years behind us. The pattern it set is the one to watch for....

What Was Lost, What Was Funded, What Was Spent, What Was Built, and What Remains As Kaʻū, Nāʻalehu, Puna, and the surrounding communities begin rebuilding after Lala, there is a case worth studying…

09/13/2026