Hawaiian Sovereignty Movement

My goodness. Did you know there was a Hawaiian Sovereignty Movement? Take a look at a very short article called "Hawaii Needs You". Here's how it gets started:

The confluence of two forces — a massive military expansion in Hawai’i and Congressional legislation that will stymie the Kanaka Maoli [Native Hawaiian] sovereignty movement — will expand and consolidate the use of Hawai’i for US empire. We are calling on the US left to join our movement opposing these threats and to add our quest for independence as a plank of the broad US left strategy for a nonimperialist America. If you support peace and justice for the United States and the world, please support demilitarization and independence for Hawai’i.

Since 1893, the United States has malformed Hawai’i into the command and control center for US imperialism in Oceania and Asia. From the hills of the Ewa district of O’ahu, the US Pacific Command — the largest of the unified military commands — directs troops and hardware throughout literally half the planet. Since the late nineteenth century, the US military has multiplied in our islands, taking 150,000 acres for its use, including one-quarter of the metropolitan island of O’ahu. Moreover, the National Security Administration is building a new surveillance facility nearby, not far from where urban assault brigades, called Strykers, will train for deployment throughout the world. The US Navy is also increasing training over the entire archipelago, including populated areas and the fragile northwestern whale sanctuary. This militarized occupation has a long history. Ke Awalau o Pu’uloa — known now as Pearl Harbor — became one of the very first overseas bases, along with Guantánamo, around the time of the Spanish-American War. We still hold much in common with prerevolution Cuba — a sugar plantation economy and status as the playground for the rich of North America.

We have suffered from the effects of being the pawn for US wars on the world. Our family members languish from strange diseases brought by military toxins in our water and soil. Our economy is a foreign-run modern plantation serving multinational shareholders and decorated generals. We salute a foreign flag, and the education system instructs us to yearn for a distant continent called the Mainland. Tourists imbibe in sunny Waīkikī, while the beaches in the native-inhabited regions are littered with chemical munitions.

This actually makes a lot of sense. I, of course, well remember when Hawaii became a state. And the propaganda at that time was that the people of Hawaii were very eager to become a state! And maybe that is so. But this movement looks at the situation in a slightly different way. I think it's worth studying up about.