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[{"type":"text","text":"Not a fan of bees..."}]

Smile 26 6 4

<title>Daily Smile: Thursday, June 4, 2026</title>

Not a fan of bees...

Daily Smile: Thursday, June 4, 2026

Kam Napier Headshot

A. Kam Napier

Columnists

Government & Politics

 Thursday. Joining former president Barak Obama and Michelle Obama in Chicago, Illinois, were former presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Joe Biden, and a host of Hollywood, music and media celebrities.

Far as I can tell, no one locally has covered this event, outside of a wire service story picked up by the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. If Hawai‘i Democrats attended the party, they were certainly quiet about it. You can hardly tell that, back in the day, Hawai‘i tried really, really hard to be the home for Obama’s presidential library.

Maybe, now that we can see it, kama‘āina are, like me, breathing a sigh of relief that it isn’t here. But first some backstory, before I dust off my architecture critic skills.

You don’t hear about this much anymore, but all through the Obama administration, Hawai‘i — well, maybe just especially prominent, political parts of Hawai‘i — were totally in love with Barack Obama. They were eager to claim him as Hawai‘i’s own, on the grounds that he attended high school here, and acted as if someone from the Islands had been elected directly to the White House. This one-sided love affair was in full swing when, early in Obama's first term, talk of his presidential library first emerged.

[{"type":"text","text":"“Pick me!” Hawai‘i said."}]

“The Hawai‘i Legislature has sent the White House a joint resolution that it passed last session urging Obama to pick Hawai‘i as the site for his library,” reported Dan Nakaso in the Star-Advertiser on 

We did more then send a resolution. Nakaso reported that a University of Hawai‘i working group would be created to study potential sites, designs, archive management policies and more. UH Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs Reed Dasenbrock was scheduled to fly to Washington D.C. “to meet with the head of the presidential library division of the National Archives and to Little Rock, Ark., to meet with the director of the Clinton Presidential Center and the Clinton Foundation.

An especially fervent fan was UH Associate Professor of American Studies Robert Perkinson, who, while he knew Chicago officials were already pushing to have the library, said, “But I feel the stars are aligned a certain way that we are really going to fight to win this. I think we’re going to do what it takes. And that means over the next months and years developing an architectural proposal that is breathtaking and a museum that’s innovative and has a really robust public education component that could benefit all of the kids of Hawai‘i and a policy center that could really help us meet Hawai‘i’s challenges and those of the larger Pacific and the larger world.”

Not that Hawai‘i believed it could beat Chicago, where Obama’s political career actually began. In a May 27, 2011 reader poll, the Star-Advertiser found that 70% of 923 respondents thought that Chicago would win.

Four years later, Hawai‘i was in the top four locations vying for the library when Star-Advertiser political columnist Richard Borreca 

on presidential libraries who advised Hawai‘i to quit. The proposed Kaka‘ako location was unlikely to draw the foot traffic that would make it succeed, and the next steps to advance were expensive in terms of developing a “detailed master development plan for the surrounding community.” Meanwhile, Borecca noted, UH was still hot for the library, hoping it would transform the university and its stature.

[{"type":"text","text":"Ultimately, Chicago won."}]

As for the architecture of the Obama Presidential Center, I’m hard pressed to say anything original, as people have been blasting it since the final design first emerged, and more so once people could see it looming 23 stories over an otherwise low-rise, residential neighborhood. It’s been compared to a mausoleum, a headstone, to Saruman’s tower in the "The Lord of the Rings," to something the Empire would build in a "Star Wars" movie. Note: When people make comparisons of this building to movie architecture, it is always Buildings for the Bad Guys.

, based in New York City. Perhaps they hated their client. Or perhaps they were bold enough to honestly reflect the singular, monumental ego of a man who once 

 while running the first time for president, “I think I could probably do every job on the campaign better than the people I’ll hire to do it” and “I think I’m a better speechwriter than my speechwriters. I know more about policies on any particular issue than my policy directors. And I’ll tell you right now that I’m gonna think I’m a better political director than my political director.”

Or, when he’d won the nomination — not the presidency, mind you, just the nomination — that 

 as “the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.”

So given all those and countless other examples, it’s no surprise the architecture stands alone, angular, imposing, humorless. It resembles Soviet naked-concrete brutalist buildings but is actually clad in American granite, yet a granite so gray that they might just as well have skipped the expense and stuck with the cement underneath.

To me, the most significant detail is the tower’s near total lack of windows. This building is literally blind to the outside world and internally recursive — all views bounce back in upon themselves to see only the interior. It’s an architectural manifestation of self-absorption.

What windows the building does have are cropped into one top corner, and are obscured by a massive a massive inscription of — what else? — a quote from one of Obama’s own speeches. One cannot look out without looking through the man himself, through his words given on the 50th anniversary of the Selma marches.

 but the inscription has been rendered deliberately illegible. Yes, deliberately.

“One of the key questions I asked at the beginning was, are people supposed to read this?” said designer Micheal Bierut, who typeset the lettering with a team at Pentagram, led by designer Britt Cobb, as reported by 

. “Is legibility the primary goal here? Do we want people to be able to stand on the ground, look up at this tower, and read those words? And that was discussed on the client end, and the answer came back, ‘No, it should have the promise of meaning, it should be decipherable, everything should be spelled right and it should make sense.’”

[{"type":"text","text":"“The promise of meaning.”"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"I just rolled my eyes so hard I pulled an eye muscle."}]

Then there’s the totally on-brand, real world social and economic dimensions of the project.

The cost of construction ballooned from $350 million to $850 million, per 

. Black residents of the neighborhood have been displaced and priced out, so much so that the city of Chicago is budgeting $6 million for affordable housing to make up for it. Construction companies are still owed “hundreds of thousands of dollars to tens of millions.” Private funding came nowhere near the investment needed and the State of Illinois, all told, will have spent some $200 million on infrastructure.

Since his foundation hasn’t paid its bills, since the building and its namesake have taken so much from their neighbors, there’s actually another famous quote from Obama that comes to mind:

[{"type":"text","text":"Mahalo, Chicago, for taking this off our hands."}]

A. Kam Napier is editor in chief of Aloha State Daily. His opinions in Pipikaula Corner are his own and not reflective of the ASD team.

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Obama library Getty Images 2281570460 16x9

<title>Pipikaula Corner: Hawai‘i dodged a library bullet</title>

Hawai‘i tried very hard to be the home of Barack Obama's presidential library. Now the thing exists in Chicago, open to the public, over budget and overwrought. ASD Editor in Chief A. Kam Napier recaps Hawai‘i's doomed quest to secure this building and gets into what the architecture of the finished project tells us.

Pipikaula Corner: Hawai‘i dodged a library bullet

Square Mike Brestovansky Headshot RGZ3736 Large

Michael Brestovansky

As the halfway point of 2026 approaches, a bevy of new laws are set to take effect.

[{"type":"text","text":"Here’s some of the new state laws to look out for starting July 1:"}]

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Shipping costs will likely increase"}]

, a measure authorizing annual automatic cost adjustments for interisland shippers for the next several years.

While interisland shippers — which, in effect, means Young Brothers LLC — have had to apply for approval from the Public Utilities Commission for any rate changes, starting in July, the PUC can develop and apply a “water carrier inflationary cost index automatic adjustment mechanism,” which will apply annual cost adjustments without any need for applications.

Those adjustments cannot be more than 5% each year, and are intended to reflect annual changes to the Department of Transportation’s wharfage rates.

The automatic adjustments are scheduled to go into effect July 1 of each year through 2032.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Your jet ski joyrides are going to cost more"}]

, increases penalties for various nautical misadventures, including:

[{"type":"text","text":"• Violating speed restrictions on a boat or jet ski,"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"• Reckless or careless operation of a vessel or jet ski,"}]

• Operating a vessel or jet ski without valid safety education or insurance coverage,

[{"type":"text","text":"• Unauthorized mooring of a vessel or jet ski,"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"• Operating a vessel or jet ski while intoxicated,"}]

• Serving, selling, drinking or possessing alcohol within state small boat harbors or boating facilities,

• Abandoning an animal within state small boat harbors or boating facilities,

Each of these violations will be considered a petty misdemeanor and will incur fines of up to $1,000 and a possible jail term of up to 30 days.

Your fish market must tell you where your ahi comes from

Lawmakers were concerned in 2025 that, due to a loophole in seafood labeling requirements, vendors were not disclosing the country of origin for ahi tuna products.

Because of this, lawmakers found that a substantial percentage of ahi products sold in Hawai‘i claim to be “prepared fresh” or “locally made” despite using foreign-caught and pre-frozen ahi.

 requires large retailers selling any raw processed ahi in Hawai‘i to include a label stating the fish’s country of origin.

You can take family leave if a family member is deployed

Currently, Hawai‘i's family leave statutes does not align with federal family leave laws, which have allowed spouses, children or parents of active-duty military members to take family leave when those family members are deployed overseas.

, which Green signed into law in May, changes this. Beginning in July, employees with military spouses, children, siblings, grandchildren or parents will be allowed four weeks of family leave per year for “qualifying military exigencies,” a phrase that refers to a person’s active-duty deployment to a foreign country.

Anyone claiming said family leave will be required to provide a copy of official military orders for documentation.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Your building permits could come through faster"}]

 allows people applying for building permits for single-family and multi-family housing projects to request to have their permits expedited.

Starting July 1, an applicant can send a request to their county for an expedited permit if 60 days have passed since the initial complete application without the county’s approval.

Eligible projects must not be located within flood hazard areas or on storm-vulnerable shoreline parcels, and must still be stamped by licensed engineers.

The expedited process is temporary; however, by July 1, 2031, it will be repealed.

Your charitable donations will have a clear destination

, requires solicitors that collect donated property such as clothes to disclose where those donations are actually going.

While people may believe that the items they donate actually directly go to charities, this isn’t always the case. In many cases, the solicitor merely sells the items, and donates some or all of the proceeds from that sale to the charities.

Act 112 requires solicitors to clearly disclose who operates a given collection receptacle and whether the donated items will be sold and the proceeds paid to a charitable organization. It also requires those solicitors to inform users as applicable whether their donations are tax-deductible contributions.

Said solicitors are also required to provably pay proceeds to a charitable organization within 45 days.

State capitol 022725

<title>New laws coming in second half of 2026</title>

Several new laws are set to take effect beginning July 1. Here are some highlights.

New laws coming in second half of 2026

Kelli Shiroma Braiotta Headshot

Kelli Shiroma Braiotta

Food & Dining

 relocated its eatery, but it’s just steps away from its former space on Kapiʻolani Boulevard.

The eatery is now located at 747 Amana Street; it’s in the former spot of a yakiniku restaurant. The eatery was temporarily closed; we got a preview of the new space during the eatery’s friends and family event, prior to its re-opening to the public on March 8.

The restaurant’s menu is the same; customers can enjoy a mix of dim sum along with the regular menu that comprises appetizers, soups, barbecue dishes, seafood, noodles, meats and veggies.

The dim sum selection includes bestsellers like shrimp dumplings ($7.50), pork hash with seafood ($7.50), baked barbecue pork buns ($7.85) and egg custard tarts ($7.50).

The regular menu features an extensive selection; signature dishes include roast duck and barbecue pork ($36.50), peking duck ($42 half, $68 whole), honey walnut shrimp ($25.50) and house special chow mein ($22.50).

There’s limited customer parking in the underground parking lot adjacent to the restaurant. Street parking is also available.

Kapiolani Seafood Restaurant dim sum 031126

<title>Kapiʻolani Seafood Restaurant moves to new location</title>

The eatery’s new location on Amana Street is just steps away from its former spot on Kapiʻolani Boulevard. The restaurant’s menu is the same, so customers can look forward to signature dim sum staples and shareable dishes like peking duck, honey walnut shrimp, Hong Kong style wonton noodles and more.

Daily Smile: Thursday, June 4, 2026

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Daily Smile: Thursday, June 4, 2026

Authors

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