expensive skies

Did anyone else see Barack Obama on Charlie Rose?

2004-11-25T10:12:00.000-08:00

The Democratic Party needs Barack Obama more than he needs it. The neo-cons have the intellectual heavy weights Rove and Wolfowitz pushing the buttons and pulling the levers that make the Republican hallucination machine spin and shine. Across the aisle the Democratic party shuffles and blames, whines to itself at night while their power slips further and further away.

And yet their is hope. Hope. Review the speeches of Clinton and Carter. They speak to a shared dream of what this country can be. They look ahead. In Kerry's stumping he always invoked the failure of the Republicans, but never clearly differentiated the character of his leadership. He never told us the story, the vision. And in constantly invoking the failures of his opponents he was forever pulling us into the past. His war cry was an indirect comparison to the very people he sought to defeat - "America Can Do Better." So what? Of course we all can do better than the Republicans. But how?

I wish Obama could be available to head the DNC. He alone has been able to cut through the chatter of the talking heads and spin monkeys. He has a vision and a story of where he would like to lead us. He is rare in politics - a rare mixture of integrity, intelligence, honesty, confidence and originality. He is Howard Dean with broad appeal and polish. He is the future of the party if it expects to remain relevant.

Jon Stewart Should Know Better And So Should We

2004-11-03T20:35:00.000-08:00

Minutes ago I watched in annoyance and mild shock as Chuck Schumer and Jon Stewart wrung their hands over the Democratic defeat. They blame it on the culutre divide. Bullshit.

The Democrats didn't lose this election because of a polarized America, they lost it because the Republicans ran a smarter and more effective campaign.

We were warned several years ago that the Republican party was way ahead in organizing in Latino communities in Florida, that they were quicker than the Democrats to understand the intricacies of this new voting bloc. They figured it out and they got there first.

Let us not forget that Jimmy Carter put the phrase "born again" in the vernacular. George W Bush learned that lesson on his father's campaign and has never forgotten it . It's time for us secular voters to acknowledge the legitiamcy of evangelicals in this country. They are not going anywhere. Carter and Clinton understood the power of the politicized pulpit, and Kerry let it slide.

Tonight Stewart and Schumer looked at the "fly over" states with a mixture of comic horror. I admit I have made those same jokes. Maybe I feel like I can since I spent the first ten years of my life in Oklahoma and Texas. However, it's time for Northeastern and West Coast progressives to drop the sneer and accept the diversity that is this country. Obama Barack reminded us in his speech at the DNC that the Democratic party is one of inclusion. But inclusion of whom? The more we buy this argument of a polarized America, the looser our grasp becomes.

I firmly belive that we lost this election because we made the safe choice in the primary. Howard Dean wasn't afraid to take chances, speak his mind, or come across as unpolished. He had original ideas for campaiging and for leading. When his distorted scream was broadcast and recast did the Democrats run to his defense? No, we let him slip by and picked a candidate who took the length of his campaign to determine who he is. Duck hunting? Give us a break.

All due respect to Kerry. He is a man of formidable intelligence. But he doesn't have the leadership qualities that are necessary to shake up a now even more conservative America. We need a leader with energy and reach and new ideas, but most importantly, we need a leader who will take risks.

We need a leader, but we also need a new party. I feel for my fellow Democrats who put their hopes in Kerry. But he is only one man, and we are the party. Take the enthusiasm and involvement and commitment that this election inspired and reshape the party on your block, in your church, at your courthouse.

The Audacity of Hope

2004-11-03T19:13:00.000-08:00

Four more years of Bush et al. A nauseating proposition. My friend Adam reminds me that someitmes it takes a Hoover before you get an FDR. At least Obama swept Illinois and sent Keyes back to his hateful perch.

Remeber Obama's speech from the DNC? The energy? The integrity?

If you need a morale boost as badly as I do, then check it out:

www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/convention2004/barackobama2004dnc.htm

Larry David for President

2004-09-16T18:48:00.000-07:00

I have been demanding that Larry David run for office. Here is why...

Are You Undecided? Or Not?
By LARRY DAVID

Los Angeles — I'd like to address this to the Undecideds: I'm on to you. You may be fooling everyone else with your little "undecided" act, but you're not fooling me. You know perfectly well whom you're voting for. The only reason you say you're undecided is that it's a cheap ploy to get attention. How do I know? Because I'm the most indecisive person in the world. I set the template, baby, and you're not passing the smell test.

You want to see real undecided? Go out to dinner with me sometime. I'll show you undecided. I look at the menu for 20 minutes, ask everybody what they're ordering, and then, finally, after I copy someone, wind up dashing into the kitchen to tell the waiter I've changed my mind.

Do a little shoe shopping with me. I guarantee you won't be able to stand it. The black ones. No, the brown ones. No, the black ones. Several of my relationships have ended in shoe stores, with women slipping out, unnoticed, never to be seen again. I even got thrown out of a poker game once because I sat there, paralyzed, unable to decide whether or not to fold. It wasn't a pretty sight, but at least it was genuine, not a bluff, like you people.

Oh, I've observed you in action. I've sat next to you at dinner parties and watched while everyone talked themselves silly, trying to get you on board. But you wouldn't budge, would you? You almost seemed to take some pleasure from it, just like my 8-year-old when she makes me beg her to take her medicine, you rascals.

The other night I saw a whole gaggle of you on TV in a focus group. You really liked chatting with professional pollster Frank Luntz, didn't you? He seemed very interested in what you had to say. Afterward, I could imagine all of you piling into a bus and heading for Denny's to discuss your exciting evening with Frank. I could see all of you staying friends even after the election. Maybe go on some trips together. Perhaps a wine tour of Tuscany. On bicycles! Oh, the life of the Undecided. Too bad they can't hold these presidential elections more often. Ah, well, you'll just have to make do.

The truth is, Undecideds, you're getting on our nerves. We Decideds hate all the attention you're getting and that you're jerking us around. Anyone who can't make up his or her mind at this point in thecampaign should forget about the election entirely, buy a pint of ice cream and get into bed.

We'd love to tell you to take a hike, but we're afraid to alienate you. If we really had any brains, we wouldn't spend another second on you, but on the people who can truly make a difference: the "unlikely" voters. And there are millions more of them than there are of you. Those people aren't after attention, they're just incredibly lazy. The only way they'll register to vote is if someone shows up at their door with a form. And then the only way they'll actually vote is if you carry them to the booth.

Not only are they lazy, they're also indifferent. They just don't believe that voting can have an effect on their lives. Well, it just so happens that right after I voted for the first time, I landed myself a big fat job in Hollywood, a biopsy came back benign and I met my future wife as soon as I walked out of the voting booth. Coincidence? You decide.

failed state anyone?

2004-09-01T00:18:00.000-07:00

Okay now. Someone help me out here because I made the mistake of mixing alcohol with Giuliani's speech at the RNC. No, I didn't have a seizure, but I swear I heard him expand upon the warbird neo-con doctrine of "pre-emptive strike." Did he really say that the greatest threat to US security is the "failed state." How do we define "failed state"? He was refering to Iraq, but he need not look farther than home where our sitting president was installed in one of the most corrupt elections in recent history - a foreboding tremor along the fault line we call representative government.

So was it just me and one too many Miller High Lifes or are the Republican intellegentsia taking that next step closer to policing thought-crime?

Of Mice and Mice

2004-08-10T12:14:00.000-07:00

McCain: "Tell me about the farm George"
Bush: "Well... there's gonna be all sorts of crops, Johnnie. Alfalfa and carrots and taters!"
McCain: "What about the animals, George? You said there gonna be lots of animals!"
Bush: "By golly there will be. Horses, and pigs, and maybe even some sheep."
McCain: "What about the rabbits George. You said we could have rabbits!"
Bush: "That's right Johnnie. A whole farm full of rabbits"
McCain: "And I get to take care of the rabbits?"

Home

2004-08-06T11:16:00.000-07:00

So I have been back for a week and am just now just getting around to post. Re-entry was a bit jarring. Jet lag and culture shock. US currency looks funny in my hand. My street, too quiet. Where is everybody? Oh yeah, all ten million of them are still in Manila where the debate rages on even though I am not there to speak it or hear it. Migrante carries on in the streets - carrying its own. Through the pollution haze the jeepneys run their routes dodging mangy dogs and collecting fares passed up from the back. Policy flows downhill and the workers head overseas and someday I hope to return...

My Other Hobby

2004-07-28T07:02:00.000-07:00

Cebu City. 8AM. A quarter mile stretch of roadway that is home to both an upscale mega-mall and a garbage strewn shanty town. It's an outdoor museum of murals. I photographed a few:

Back to Manila

2004-07-27T01:17:00.000-07:00

Still in Cebu City. I am posting from "Big Bucks." It even has a faux-Starbucks logo. And while I don't ususally patronize Starbucks when I am home, I can't resist the underdog here. Similarly I find excuses to eat at Jollibee, the leading fast food chain which seems to be trumping McDonalds - well at least in the Philippines. Can a corporation be characterized as an "underdog"? Why is an exotic corporation somehow less corporate? That's one for Joel Bakan.

Back to Manila tomorrow where I will participate in an ED, educational discussion. Members of the labor activist org Migrante will sit down with me for the better part of a day and relate to me the socio-economic history of the OFW (overseas filipino worker). My aim is to learn the facts and analyses that I haven't been able to glean from traditional media outlets. Wish me luck. Photos and text to come...

Ricardo Motalban

2004-07-26T05:29:00.000-07:00

Welcome my friend to the magical island of Camiguin. Did you enjoy your flight? Perhaps appreciate the view from your plane?

If you are weary form your flight might I suggest a dip in one of our waterfalls?

I see that you are invigorated from this cold plunge. Care to hike a volcano?

Or for the more - how do you say? - kinesthetic? You may wish to fashion your own hot pool from rocks and allow hot spring water to well up in homage to Andy Galsworthy?

Bohol

2004-07-26T05:22:00.000-07:00

Last week Marnee, Berna, and I travelled to the island of Bohol - where everything looks like a postcard:

Vacation

2004-07-22T02:40:00.000-07:00

So I've been in Bohol with Berna and Marnee for the past three days too busy (sitting on beaches, drinking mango shakes, and not taking pictures) to post. Sorry folks but I just had to put the camera down. Off to Camiguin tomorrow to soak in a hot spring in the ocean and hike a volcano. When I find an internet cafe there I will post some pix. Wish me luck...

Taking a Break from the Misery Index

2004-07-17T05:35:00.000-07:00

Okay. Okay. After my last posting about Payatas I realize that my blog has been a bit heavy. So... just to show that Manila is not all gloom and doom I offer you pix of adorable children:

Although her PR people deny it, actress Jennifer Love Hewitt is actually a Filipino toddler.

I love it when a children look so serious:

Taking Care Of Business

Don't be fooled, this guy is a handful. He gave me the finger just after posing for this.

Payatas

2004-07-15T07:30:00.000-07:00

Today we travelled to Payatas. We met with Edwin, an activist with Cadamay. He advocates on behalf of the people of Payatas who were the victms of a "garbageslide" in 1990. Most of you are probably not familiar with a "garbageslide". Allow me to illustrate. Imagine that you are living on the outskirts of a major city. This city then decides to turn your backyard (and I do mean backyard) into a garbage dump. And they stack the refuse so dangerously high that, when the seasonal monsoons blow through, a wall of wet trash crushes and kills hundreds of your neighbors. Now you are familiar with the expression "garbageslide." Here is Edwin explaining how to properly stack garbage in terrace formation so that it doesn't fall on and kill people.

This is the condition of the current dumpsite - not two hundred feet from the backyard of a Payatas resident. The white letters say "WELCOME PGMA." PGMA = President Gloria Macapalgal, the president of the Philippines. Despite their plight the residents of Payatas are not without a sense of humor.

This is a little girl whom I chatted with in a mixture of my bad Tagalog and her broken English. I didn't catch her name. She was too busy playing in the rain.

Jhing

2004-07-13T18:22:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we met Jhing. He is an OFW - an overseas filipino worker. The government here supports sending its citizens overseas to work as contract laborers so that they will send money back home, this money collectively being the 2nd largest source of income for the country.

Jhing was hired to work in iraq. This is the wound he received when a mortar shell exploded in his camp.

Jhing has to pay his own medical bills even though the country would collapse without people like him risking their lives overseas. More on how they profit off OFW sweat later...

Angelos de la Cruz

2004-07-11T21:05:00.000-07:00

We the filmmakers are being hosted by a group called "migrante." They are busy showing their support for for Angelos de la Cruz - a filipino national being held captive by Iraqi insurgents. They are threatening to behead him unless GMA (the president of the philippines) withdraws filipino troops from iraq - all 51 of them. GMA refuses to withdraw troops now - it would endanger what she considers her privileged relationship with president bush. Migrante and other organizations have been holding a series of rallies and vigils to demand the withdrawal of filipino troops from iraq and the safe return of angelos de la cruz. So far the iraqi captors have issued two delays.

This is a snapshot I took from one of the vigils:

Manila

2004-07-10T19:57:00.001-07:00

So I made it here safely. It's hard to concentrate in this internet cafe because the locals love to sing along to the American music that blasts from the sub woofer. In a rush right now to make a news conference concering the confusion over Angelos de la Cruz' delayed liberation from his Iraqi captors. Will write more later...

Cuevas Family Deported

2004-07-01T11:45:00.000-07:00

to read the san francisco chronicle's coverage go to:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/07/01/CUEVAS.TMP

an independent local news org followed the story as well

www.indybay.org -

Cuevas Family Reports to SFO for Deportation
6/30/04: (San Francisco) The Cuevas family of Fremont, California, a Filipino family that brought national attention to the plight of undocumented immigrant families, left this evening from San Francisco International Airport, headed for the Philippines. California had been the family's home for nineteen years.The Support Committee for the Cuevas Family, members of the Filipino immigrant
community and immigrants’ rights advocates prepared a “heroes’ send-off” for the Cuevas family at 6:00 pm at SFO in front of the Philippine Airlines front desk.

Farewell

2004-06-30T01:24:00.000-07:00

It's 1:30 AM here on the west coast and i am trying to find a picture of the cuevas family online and am failing miserabaly. i spent three days with the family last week with my camera resting idly in my pocket, so engrossed with my video work that i forgot to grab a still. damn. but if you want to read more about them, check this out:

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/03/24/BAGF85Q9K01.DTL

there is a tiny image of dale, dominique, and donna

barring a last minute miracle, they will be on a plane back to the philippines today.

more filmmakers

2004-06-29T11:48:00.000-07:00

this is the associate producer marnee.

the filmmakers

2004-06-29T11:32:00.000-07:00

this is noilyn and bernadette. they are the producers of this documentary.

bernadette is on the left. noilyn is on the right. you can tell that noilyin is asking a good question because she has her hand raised. unfortunately noilyn will not be able to come to the philippines with us.

the calm before the philippines

2004-06-28T12:18:00.000-07:00

so we just wrapped a week of shooting in the san francisco bay area. we spent most of our time with the cuevas family during their last days here before being deported back to the philippines. in all the political analysis about identity polititcs, the role of homeland securtiy, and what it means to be american - delfin cuevas reduced it to this "this is all about a piece of paper."