 Hello from the heart of downtown Honolulu, Hawaii. I'm Michael North. I'm sitting in for David Chang on today's edition of The Art of Thinking Smart, in which we try to identify ways that people who have significant experience in government and in business in solving problems can share what they've learned over a lifetime. So we're really pleased to welcome a guest here today. He's one of Hawaii's leading citizens and is the former mayor of Honolulu. He's the 13th mayor of Honolulu in our life. He also served as the prosecuting attorney, the third elected prosecuting attorney. You served for 16 years, is that correct? Yes. And then served as mayor. And now you're back in the private sector again and doing all kinds of creative and interesting things. So it's kind of a good time for you to sort of hit pause at this moment and look back. And here's a question for you. Think back, you're from New Jersey, right? I am. You're a glorious garden state. You have our sympathies. You're forgiven for all of New Jersey's sins because you've lived here for so long. Yes. How many years have you lived in Hawaii? Thirty-four, I believe now. Right. You have a nice house up in Hawaii Kai. You're a neighbor. Yeah. You've snuck into the neighborhood. You have a view over everything. And you work for one of the leading law firms here in downtown Honolulu now. You've engaged in some interesting projects. But I want you to think back to when you were 24 years old. That's a long, long time ago. Yeah. Just, you know, a few years. Starting out. But you can remember. I can. Remember probably quite vividly where you were living, what you were doing, what you were thinking. And if you were like me, at 24, you were making all kinds of very interesting mistakes. Or you had ideas that might take you in directions that were not fully productive, right? Now, these empty bump years later, as you look back, what would you say to that young man? What advice would you give to that young man? Well, I think you sort of come into a period in your life where you think that you're going to be not solving the problems of the world, but basically telling people what they need to do correctly, when in fact you really don't know the answer to that question. And you are far more aggressive, as most young men are, and sometimes too drawn to having attention drawn to yourself. And those types of views dissipate more and more. And you learn, I think we both know, that it's far more valuable to listen, if you're in a position of authority, than it is to constantly be speaking or barking orders. So listening. Listening is a big part of maturity. It's also a big part of leading people in a direction that they're leaning towards, and it's going to be advantageous to themselves as well as their community. Right. Yeah, you definitely have a reputation of being a good listener. I do that largely because if I don't listen to my wife, all purgatory breaks loose very quickly. Well, she's taught you very much. Very valuable. I'm an indentured servant to the woman. Can you transmit that sort of skill in the rest of your life too? I hope so. You have clients in your law firm, and the key to being a successful attorney, or a successful prosecuting attorney, or a successful mayor, I think, is listening to many, many voices. And then what do you do once you've heard, once you've listened, then what? Well, then the job is to analyze what's being requested, try to understand what the client wants, and then if what they want is impractical, impossible, or extremely difficult, or too expensive, then you have to convince them of a different path to take that will be more beneficial for them. And so it's really, client control is something that lawyers talk a lot about. If you can assist your client in getting to a place that's to their great advantage, but it requires the skill of pointing them that in direction and controlling them to get to that particular point, then that's something that you need to be able to do. And that, I think, comes with maturity. And does that apply in the political realm as well? When you think of what you just said as the mayor, you have many constituencies in the public, you've got the press, you've got your city council, you've got your own administration, all of whom have their own ideas and their own egos and so on. It's a complicated juggling. It is, and the problem is that, really, the way that you get to be the mayor who is an administrator of something like 10,000 people, that's where your skills as basically a leader come into play. But to get to that position, you have to play the political game. And the political game is, I mean, it's notorious for by-lie and plagiarize. And that's the game of politics, and we've seen it certainly in the last election cycle in terms of what people were saying before they got into the position and after they got into the position. So those things are very problematic if you don't like playing those types of political games and you're not willing to engage in the by-lie or plagiarize. And does this principle of being a good listener and a synthesizer, does that apply in the world of business too, if you're a business leader, if you're an entrepreneur, a CEO? I would say most definitely. I think that there are, I don't believe in micromanagement. I don't believe in power and control and leadership. And I think those people who adopt the idea that we're all in this business and we're all working together, I just happen to be the person who is at the top of the food chain or I have the title. But frankly, you're going to be the people who make the business successful. And that's exactly what's going to happen if you're in a position such as the mayor. If you put the right people around you, then those people are going to make the city run smooth, well, and efficiently and cost-effectively. I always relate very closely to an expression that comes out of the Dao De Jing, which is the most ancient book of Chinese philosophy, the book from which all the other works of philosophy come. And Lao Tzu says, when the job of the great man is complete, the people say we did it ourselves. You know, that's exactly correct. That makes all sorts of sense. And I believe that that's really the type of leadership that is needed in today's modern societies to move us forward to a place of smart thinking, which is what you're talking about now. So thinking back to that young Peter Carlisle, that twenty-four-year-old. He had a lot more hair, you know, the body frame was a little different, and the joints were a lot more mobile. You weren't a surfer yet? I hadn't surfed by then. That started at fifty. Well, thinking back to that, okay, so now you've said, young Peter, listen, learn to listen. What other art of thinking smart can you relay to him now that he would profit from? Well, I think a lot of that had to do with my career path, one becoming a lawyer and two becoming a prosecutor. And to get the right type of people in the prosecutor's office who can assist in law enforcement and to help make our society a safer place, you have to have people who are willing not to be in it for the money, because you're going to be making a whole lot more money in the private sector. And some people, that's their entire sense of worth, has to do with how big their bank accounts are. And that's not the kind of person who you want in the prosecutor's office. You want somebody who is willing to take a cut if they're somebody who's experienced in pay, and you want them to do it for the purpose of making your community safer. So you would say, Peter, don't do it for the money. Do it for the... Well, actually for the love of the work and also for the greater good of the community. And always, always, we have in America a fairly short attention span looking forward to only about six months. We'd be a lot better off to do long-term thinking and long-term planning, which I know there are, that does happen in the United States on a number of occasions, but perhaps not as frequently or as far reaching as we would want it to do. I think the rail project, which has been tremendously controversial, is an idea of looking well into the future and knowing that it's going to be benefiting other members of our community. That was certainly true for H3. That was certainly true for the widening of Kalani-Anioli Highway. We used to have horrific, horrific traffic jams at that one little neck where it went from four lanes down to two, and now that's been completely alleviated, and the rail system is to help those people who haven't been given the benefit of those types of projects, and that's West Oahu. So in order to achieve something like that, you have to be able to convince people that they need to be able to invest in the future and accept the cost and the inconvenience and so on now in favor of a further goal in the future, and you have to be able to sustain that vision. How do you do that? Yes, but you're also telling them, look, you're not going to be getting a direct benefit from this because you've already been taken care of, and now it's your time to basically assist your fellow citizens, your brothers and sisters here in Hawaii or here in Honolulu specifically, with the problem that they have in terms of the drive from basically that side to get to the university or to get to downtown is tailor-made for human suffering. I know, I used to take it all the time. And so it's time for the rest of us to say, hey, look, you were there, you helped fund the widening of Kalani-Anioli Highway, you helped fund H3 for the windward side, and now it's our turn to help you be able to have an alternative where you can get what now takes you two hours going and coming is going to take you 45 minutes. But that's leadership. It's convincing people to go from I-Me-Mind this short term, how does it affect me to seeing a broader community vision that we're all part of? I think that that's a form of the type of smart thinking that you're talking about. When you start thinking about universal goals, first off, beyond the city, beyond the state, beyond the country, and then internationally, that's what we want to look at. And we have so reduced the amount of time between our being able to speak to people in other locations almost automatically as opposed to when we used to have the Western riders who were bringing in their telegrams across the plains. It's a different world. Yes, the Pony Express. So now we're going to take a break here with the Pony Express, and we'll come back. Enthusiastic. St. Tech, Hawaii, Asia in reveal. I am Johnson Choi, the host. Looking forward to see you next month, December 15, Thursday, 11, right here at this channel. Aloha. Aloha. My name is Danelia, D-A-N-E-L-I-A. And I'm the other half of the duo. John Newman, welcome. We are co-hosts of a show called Keys to Success, which is live on the ThinkTech Live Network series, weekly on Thursdays at 11 AM. We're looking forward to seeing you then. Aloha. Aloha. My name is Josh Green. I serve as Senator from the Big Island on the Kona side, and I'm also an emergency room physician. My program here on ThinkTech is called Health Care in Hawaii. I'll have guests that should be interesting to you twice a month. We'll talk about issues that range from mental health care to drug addiction to our health care system, and any challenges that we face here in Hawaii. We hope you'll join us. Again, thanks for supporting ThinkTech. 24. OK, we're back now with Peter Carlisle, thinking smart with our former mayor. Peter, we were just talking about the young Peter and where he was and what he was doing when he was 24. And we just figured, oh, you were at UCLA. I was going to law school? We were graduating law school. I was? It was the mid to late 70s. Correct. So you were a young dude in Southern California in the heart of the disco age. Remember? I recall some of that, most of which I tried, tried, tried to rega it. So. Oh, please. I think you just broke the tube. You've got to do that shot with the arm, OK? John Travolta. So remembering him clearly now, the John Travolta version of Peter Carlisle, what further do you have to say to him? We've talked about listening, and we've talked about not thinking short term. We've talked about acting in terms of principle. So that's one and two. What's a third idea that we can relate to that young man? Well, I don't think he'd gotten over the phase where he thought of self first. And I think that that came later. It became more and more obvious as I was in law school. They had a quarter away program, which meant that you could leave the school and go to other locations. And you would get credit for the hours, but you wouldn't get a grade. And I had two options. And one was to, and I always knew that I was interested in the criminal law. So I could go to Alaska and work in the public defender's office, at which point they would have given me $2,000 a month to do that. Or I could go to Honolulu, Hawaii, and work in the prosecutor's office and give me, I think it was $400 a month. So it was a dramatic change. But it was a decision that I made faster than the speed of light. Because I knew that I wanted to be a prosecutor more than I wanted to defend people who I knew had preyed on other people. Yet we're presumed innocent, of course. Of course we're presumed innocent. There has to be a process. But once the process is served, then you have the option with people who have done particularly bad things to have them isolated from their other members of the community. So do we say to young Peter, go with your heart? I'd say that's what, yeah. I'd say it was mostly heart. And certainly a part of it was mind as well. But that was what my interest was doing was to be a trial attorney and to stand in front of juries and to argue cases in front of them. And that was what I wanted to do. And these days, you can hardly never do that in the private sector. Back then you could. So I've done some civil cases too, but not during that period of my life. But that was what I wanted to be able to do. And I was happy that I was given the opportunity. I always thought that what I would really like to be able to do is to have a very large murder case or a murder case and try it to conviction and get an appropriate sentence for the defendant. And that happened very quickly within a couple of years, actually, as a prosecutor. But then after that, it was moving through the ranks to be able to teach other people how to do it and ultimately to lead the office. Hello, I'm Mary Ann Sasaki. Welcome to Think Tech Hawaii, where some of the most interesting conversations in Honolulu go on. I have a show on Wednesdays from one to two called Life in the Law, where we discuss legal issues, politics, governmental topics, and a whole host of issues. I hope you'll join me. Aloha. My name is Carl Campania, and I am the host of Think Tech Hawaii's Movers, Shakers, and Reformers, the Politics in Hawaii series. Join us each week as we have guest after guest talking about the policy and the politics of our state, of our islands, and of what really matters to each of us. So please, join us each week and engage in that conversation. Mahala. OK, coming back to Peter. So here I see you're here. Let's ask this in the other direction. OK, let's see. Now, what did the 24-year-old equivalent of you, you, itself? Well, I'm the host, man. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You get to be toasted as well as the rest of us, so. OK, OK, what would I say to the 24-year-old? First off, where were you and what were you doing? I was in Toronto, and I was teaching at the university, and I was in the publishing business as well. I had run a restaurant for some time, and I had bought and sold my first two or three pieces of real estate. So I was kind of getting into my business mode, and I would say that I was driven by opportunities. Whatever came to me, I would react, and I would pick it up, and I would immediately go for it. So I would say to that young man, learn to say no. It's important to say yes to the right things, but the majority of opportunities that come across your bow are going to be no's. So take the time to listen carefully, evaluate, look at long-term goals, and look at consistency of the things that you're doing. Try to group them in a way that makes sense, and that makes an identity, and move in that direction, and say yes to those things. I would also say work with people you know and trust and feel akamai with. I didn't know the word akamai, the Canadian guy in Toronto, but the meaning is clear. And sometimes in search of an opportunity, you'll work with somebody that you know has flaws, that you know has questionable this, that, and the other, but the opportunity is so great that you want to grab it anyways, and you figure you can control the circumstances. I would say to that young guy, you can't. Go with the people you know that you trust. Did you have any idea that you would end up in Honolulu, Hawaii and spend your life here and be married to a beautiful Chinese lady? No. And did any of that cross your mind? Not in the slightest. Did you think it was even slightly possible? Not in the most distant view of anything conceivable. Interesting. I was an East Coast guy. I'd spent a lot some time in New York, even at 24. And I knew that I wanted to go to New York. I knew I wanted to make my mark on Fifth Avenue and Wall Street. So I knew I was going around. The city that never sleeps. Yeah. Yeah. I bought the whole Frank Sinatra riff. And I was a Yankees fan and everything. And I did do that. And I'm so grateful for the time that I've spent in New York and still have so many great friends there. And it's the greatest American city. And I still go there whenever I can. We've been there together. We have. And I do want to remind you that while you people in New York do have Ellis Island, the Statue of Liberty belongs to New Jersey. Oh, OK. Got that straight. So I'm thinking of the young prosecutor who's just gotten here. Let's roll forward a few years later. And you've established yourself in and you have a role in the courtroom now. I kind of got a theatrical sort of thing from you. Like when you said I wanted to be standing in front of a jury and pleading my case and winning it. I got a Hollywood kind of feel from, am I correct? I would say that that's perfectly accurate. So there are people who like to have attention. I happen to be one of them. And the attention that I would like to have had and was fortunate enough to get was to be able to actively assist the safety of a community through criminal prosecution of those people who have committed crimes. So you have a strong motivation for the protection of the community, protection of the helpless, the victim, and for justice for those who break the law. Yeah, and also to have a safe environment where people can thrive. And if you have a place that's ridden with crime and a decaying society, that's not good for the society whatsoever. So that's a passion that you followed. I always wanted to be glad you followed it and it led you right through the mayorship and now to where you're in a productive post-political career. Correct. One thing that I really admire about your career is that you've been post-partisan your entire political career. Right. You've been friends with Democrats and working closely. You've been friends with Republicans and working closely, but not always carrying one flag or the other, carrying sort of the flag of the common interest. Actually, we sort of started the whole idea of a nonpartisan with Chuck Marslin, who was my boss. And the idea is that crime isn't Republican or Democrat. It's basically something that's nonpartisan. And that spread throughout the city. It ended up moving from the prosecutor's office to city council to the mayor's job. So the idea of nonpartisanship was always something that I held dear. And I felt that it was a far more productive way of handling criminal justice. Obviously, the people sense that. They recognize that. They appreciate it. And they sent you back to the same office again and again. They let me hang around for a while. Actually, until I chose, it was time to move on. And that's when I moved into the mayor's job. OK, we're coming right up to the end. And I want to ask one more. Of the cases that you did argue successfully in that office, can you give us a thumbnail description of the very best one, the accomplishment that you're the most proud of from that passion? Well, in terms of a single case, the one that was most interesting to me was the one involving a guy by the name of Kirk Langford. And Langford killed a Japanese national. And it was entirely a circumstantial evidence case because Langford had successfully disposed of the body. And he had an elaborate description of why things had happened and that he had not killed this person and why he felt it was necessary for him to dispose of the body. And fortunately, it was a very, very long and involved case and required a lot of circumstantial evidence. And the jury was able to bring back a verdict rather quickly in that case. And now this very sociopathic person who probably was involved in at least one other killing, although we can't prove it. So it's not a certainty. And who also was responsible for a number of sexual assaults on girls who were dancers. He is now in a position where he won't be seeing daylight while he's on this side of the grave. Where is he now? I'm not sure where. I think he's located in one of the mainland facilities. And he's there and will stay there. So we thank you for putting him in a place where he can't hurt anybody. Yeah, that's it. And he was abusive to his wife. And he had a child that he was abusive to. So all of those things are. And yet he was a devout because his father was very religious. He was a devout, devout in tending and attending church. So it was real. Sounds like he was a good actor himself. I think that's a really good way of putting it. I hadn't thought of that, but thank you, Michael. Thank you so much, Peter. It's good to be here. I'm sorry I didn't bring my tie. I feel practically naked without it. So we send our greetings back to young Peter Carlisle. Thank you, my friend. Have a great day.