6th annual Michael Moore festival: A success for all of Michigan and the film industry

More than 106, 000 viewers reveled in the exotic, interesting, unique, and independent films presented by Michael Moore and the Traverse City Film Festival in 2010! Besides such wonderful films as NOWHERE BOY (the story of John Lennon’s coming of age as a teenage rocker maverick); THE INFIDEL ( the hilarious comic presentation of a Muslim family man who discovers his biological Jewish roots from adoption records); and THE IRANIAN COOKBOOK ( a documentary which reveals the constant cooking of the Iranian mothers and wives for Ramadan), film viewers were transfixed by the magic of the filmmaking world, its directors, writers, and performers.

A Cuban adventure with Lee Lockwood

In July 1967, I met Lee Lockwood at the Mexico City ticket counter of Cubana de Aviacion. He had black curly hair, a confident almost smug look and he toted camera bags. “I loved your book, the best, most honest book on Cuba,” (Castro’s Cuba; Cuba’s Fidel which he later updated) I told him. “Brilliant photos,” which he had taken for Life Magazine. “Thanks,” he snorted.

He had recently returned from Hanoi. He told me he’d run into the street just before U.S. planes bombed to get shots of Vietnamese civilians heading for air raid shelters – man hole covers. (“North Vietnam Under Siege,” Life Magazine, April 7, 1967)

Lee had another assignment from Life and I, with Richard Moore and Irving Saraf, had a contract for a public television film on Cuba (Report from Cuba).

Bourj el-Barajneh: Searching for meaning in a refugee camp

Beirut, Lebanon - Two young girls stood, as if frozen, starting below them at an ever vibrant Beirut. Their balcony, like the rest of their house and most of their refugee camp was of an indistinct color. It was dirty, as were their clothes. They, on the other hand, looked beautiful and bright, although their future didn't.

Here in Bourj el-Barajneh, one of a dozen Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, time seems to have stood still for years. Generation after generation, children grow up in the same desperate reality, punished for crimes they did not commit, injured by a history not of their making. They stand on dirty balconies, cracked beyond repair, watching Beirut and the world go by.

The city is abuzz with life, politics, rumors, anticipation and intrigue. It remains perpetually divided between many worlds and contradictions, in a way that seems almost impossible to reconcile or bridge.

The road to recovery

They cannot shackle the truth, gag those who speak it, or blind us from seeing it...

"Truth lives a wretched life, but always survives a lie." --Anonymous

Last night, Bite Club of KC canvassed two heavily trafficked night spots in Kansas City, educating thousands of people about the University of Kansas Medical Center’s fraudulent waste of millions of our taxpayer dollars (which they attain via National Institute of Health grants) on fraudulent research AND about the abject cruelty (as evidence by the 160 violations of animal welfare laws for which the USDA cited them) that KU Med inflicts upon primates.

We distributed over 200 copies of this article by SAEN’s Michael Budkie which references publicly available summaries of animal abuse, as documented by KU Med’s own employees in federally required logs about their “patients.” A vast percentage of those members of the public who engaged us were outraged by the primate vivisection program at KU Med and stated they would help us shut them down any way they could.

Eduardo Caraballo

Let's give country reason to celebrate

Barack Obama comes home this week to celebrate his birthday, and to visit a Ford plant that has begun hiring again, aided by federal loan guarantees for clean energy production. Although Ford wasn't bailed out, it is part of an auto industry saved by the president's bold decision -- a decision that is paying off as the restructured companies are turning a profit and putting people back to work.

The auto company rescue was unpopular when President Bush first made the decision to intervene -- so that his successor could make his own choice. It was unpopular when Obama decided to rescue the companies, with an arranged bankruptcy for General Motors and Chrysler forcing restructuring. It is unpopular to this day. But it has worked. And it saved an estimated million jobs that would likely have been lost if the auto industry had been allowed to fail.

That success was the result of bold action. And now we need more bold action to help Chicago, Illinois and the nation -- which seem perilously close to turning back toward recession.

Buddhist "Body Snatchers" collect Bangkok's dead and dying

BANGKOK, Thailand -- Fearless body snatchers careen through traffic, with sirens blaring and lights flashing, to morbid disaster sites where they seize fresh human corpses to pack in mustard-colored coffins for yet another profitable cremation.

"I see dead people all the time, but I've never seen ghosts," Anyawut Phoamphai, 36, says in Thai, maniacally chuckling and slamming his foot on the accelerator of a new Toyota van.

"Before doing this work, I was afraid of ghosts. But I'm not afraid of ghosts now. And I'm not afraid to get sick while handling dead people. I'm not afraid to touch their corpses. I wear Buddhist amulets and they protect me."

If you or anyone else you know -- Thai or foreigner -- suddenly drops dead in Bangkok, chances are your body will be grabbed by a team of eager men and women who will carefully wrap you in white cloth, carry you away hammock-style, and lay you into the back of a van for a trip to a nearby hospital's forensic lab.

An honest look at Obama's first year

Most commentary on President Barack Obama either beats him up unfairly because he's not a Republican or cuts him extra slack because he's not a Republican. If, in the privacy of your own home, you want to pause and review the main events of the first year or more of this presidency, as recorded by someone who obviously doesn't care about partisan boosting, I recommend Paul Street's new book "The Empire's New Clothes: Barack Obama in the Real World of Power."

This is an excellent detailed analysis from a progressive writer willing to note the good, the bad, and the ugly, and to admit when the bad and the ugly seem to be dominating the scene. It's early, of course, for an overview of this presidency. And it's still early for a lot of potential readers to be able to handle the truth. But this book lays out the highlights and lowlights in a way that should advance readers' understanding.

Tell Google "Don't be evil!"

Google's motto is "Don't be evil," but Google is about to cut a deal with Verizon that would end the Internet as we know it.

According to a front-page New York Times story, the deal would allow "Verizon to speed some online content to Internet users more quickly if the content's creators are willing to pay for the privilege."1

It would create fast Internet lanes for the largest corporations and slow lanes for the rest of us.

That is why CREDO is joining MoveOn, Free Press, and Color of Change in rallying Google users to tell Google, "Don't be evil."

Speak up for a free and open Internet by clicking here to automatically sign the petition to Google. With massive amounts of public pressure, we can stop this deal.

Google is furiously backpedaling on its closed door negotiations with Verizon over the future of the Internet — a direct result of a strong and immediate public backlash. The company has denied some details from the New York Times story, but won't say definitively that it is not striking a deal with Verizon that will stop the FCC from imposing net neutrality rules.

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