A coalition of local environmental groups including Native Hawaiian Legal Corporation, Hawai’i’s Thousand Friends and the Sierra Club Hawai’i Chapter are calling for state Department of Land and Natural Resources (DLNR) Director Peter Young to complete a fairly long list of tasks within two months or resign. Pissed at Young for his reluctance to ban commercial usage of the ‘Ahihi-Kina’u Natural Area Reserve and his ham-fisted attempts to dissolve the State Water Commission, the groups want Young to hire a bunch of technically proficient deputy directors and managers, set deadlines for adopting instream flow standards throughout the state and just generally do his job. By coincidence, this comes as the state House Committee on Water, Land and Ocean Resources are considering auditing Young and the DLNR… The Associated Press is running a story today saying that Baghdad—which means “Garden of God” in Arabic—has really gone to seed. Gee, I wonder why! Now I would have thought that all the bombs we’ve been dropping and near-continuous mortar and small-arms fire we’ve been exchanging with the still nebulous insurgency 23 months after we supposedly won the war would have made the place a paradise on Earth. Silly me. In fact, the AP reported that London-based Mercer Human Resources Consulting surveyed 215 cities worldwide, and found that the quality of life in the so-called “City of Peace” has dropped to dead last—behind even Fargo, North Dakota! But there is good news—today’s Maui News is reporting that this week the island-based 411th Engineer Battalion of the U.S. Army Reserve will be returning to Hawai’i after a year’s tour in Iraq.