US To Give Israel $30 Billion in Military Aid BBC Newshttp://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_ea st/6948981.stmUS Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns has signed a deal that will provide Israel with $30 billion of military aid over the next ten years. The Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, has said the aid will preserve his country's military advantage over other countries in the Middle East. The new military aid package represents a 25 percent increase from present levels. The US announced multi-billion-dollar arms deals with Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and other Gulf states last month. Washington says it wants to help its allies in the Middle East meet their security needs and counter the growing power of Iran in the region.
Analysis: New US-Israeli Arms Deal Jonathan Marcus - BBC Newshttp://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6949904. stmThis new agreement sets increased levels of US military aid for Israel over the coming decade. In broad terms, Israel will receive a total of some $30 billion in military aid, a significant increase over $24 billion it received over the past ten years. This is welcome news for Israel... Quite apart from the boost this gives to Israel's armed forces, it also sends a powerful signal of Washington's continued support for its principal ally in the region.
No Strings Attached to New US Defense Package for Israel Haaretz (Israel) http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/894644.ht mlThe new $30 billion American defense package for Israel is not conditioned on diplomatic progress or concessions to the Palestinians, a top U.S. aide said Thursday as representatives from both countries signed the memorandum of understanding in Jerusalem. U.S. Under Secretary of State Nicholas Burns said the aid to Israel was meant to counter "an axis of cooperation between Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and Hamas that is responsible for the violence in the region."
U.S. Highways Badly in Need of Repair MSNBChttp:// www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20095291/The U.S. highway system is broken. And it's not clear where the money is going to come from to fix it. Amid a steady rise in congestion and ongoing deterioration of decades-old roads and bridges, federal and state funding is failing to keep up with the need to maintain existing infrastructure and increase capacity. And the cash shortfall is only going to get worse, with the Federal Highway Trust Fund - supported by a tax on gasoline - projected to run dry in 2009.
Sunic's New Book, Homo Americanus: A Review Paul Gottfriedhttp://www.takimag.com/blogs/article/homo_ americanusA polyglot Croatian scholar, Tomislav Sunic, provides in his newest book, Homo Americanus: Child of the Postmodern Age, reasons that a good European should distrust the US... Sunic gives the proper reasons that Europeans should despise us, namely, because we are hostile to European national identities, because we have contributed to bringing to Central Europe Frankfurt School brain-laundering and last but not least, because we try to substitute for concrete historical traditions such notions as propositional nationhood and the ideology of human rights.
Diversity May Not Be The Answer Gregory Rodriguez -- Los Angeles Timeshttp://www.miamiherald.com/851/story/207371.ht ml... You've heard the rap: Diversity is our strength. We should celebrate it, blah, blah, blah. ... But according to a provocative new study by Robert Putnam, one of America's preeminent political scientists, it's just not true. ... Diversity, he argues, is turning us into a nation of turtles, hunkered down with our heads in our shells. According to the study, there is a strong positive relationship between interracial trust and ethnic homogeneity. In other words, the less diverse your community, the more likely you are to trust the people in it who are different from you. The flip side is also true: The more ethnically diverse the people you live around, the less you trust them.
OUTRAGEOUS!!!
Congress Considers Federal Funds for 'Holocaust Education' The Jewish Advocate (Boston)http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/article .php?pg=3&ar=97With more than 62 years having passed since the Shoah, local and state lawmakers are working to give Holocaust education a boost. Currently being reviewed by committees in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate, the Simon Wiesenthal Holocaust Education Assistance Act - if passed - would provide select organizations nationwide with competitive grants to be used to develop Holocaust curriculum guides as well as training for teachers. The act would distribute $10 million - $2 million yearly for five years - in federal funding to establish these programs ...
Holocaust Remembrance: What's Behind the Campaign? Mark Weberhttp://www.ihr.org/leaflets/holocaust_remem brance.shtml... Holocaust remembrance is not, as its supporters claim, a noble effort motivated by sincere concern for humanity. Instead, this relentless campaign is an expression of Jewish-Zionist power, and is designed to further Jewish-Zionist interests... The Holocaust remembrance campaign reflects an arrogant view of Jews as a special and superior people... Jewish death and suffering do not deserve to be venerated more than the death and suffering of non-Jews. The Holocaust remembrance campaign deserves scorn, not support, because it is a one-sided effort that serves narrow Jewish and Israeli interests and bolsters Jewish-Zionist power.
Doubts Emerge About 'Inspiring' Holocaust Story The Associated Presshttp://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070819/ ap_on_re_eu/ukraine_holocaust_tale_2;_ylt=AujiQzl6.x 3enNAAnsVuAGwF1vAI It is a story of courage and kindness during the first tragic days of the Holocaust in Ukraine - the tale of how a village rose up against an anti-Semitic gang of killers to save its Jewish neighbors. A researcher stumbled on the inspiring story this year... But another survivor says there were no heroes in Ispas. And a leading Holocaust expert says that most of the Jews of Ispas were killed by fellow villagers. (gee we all wonder why)
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Monday, August 27, 2007
CONTROLLED PRESS LIES ABOUT ISRAELI MICHAEL CHERTOFF
I just watched CNN heap praise upon Chertoff only to come across the following online. REad it and weep.
Michael Chertoff: The Man & His Star-Crossed Past
Written by Jim Kirwan
Sunday, 26 August 2007
Very few Americans, not directly affected by this man of many faces have no idea, of who really directs the duties of the 180,000 government employees in DHS: Duties that this man now holds in his stained and conflicted hands. It seems that the variety of controversies which have paralleled Michael Chertoff's meteoric rise in government have been allowed to languish in the shadows for far too long. If the public does not soon become familiar with who their Director of Homeland Security really is-then they may live to regret that oversight.
The details of Michael Chertoff's personal history should have disqualified him for high office: but instead his nomination for this job was approved without objection by the Senate."The Senate voted 98-0 to approve Chertoff on February 15. Chertoff, 51, took the oath of office that night in "a private ceremony at the White House."DHS has a $32 billion budget, 180,000 employees, and jurisdiction over immigration, customs and transportation security, the Coast Guard, the Secret Service and the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The question of Chertoff's dual-nationality doesn't seem to have concerned a single U.S. senator.Many have wondered who let the detained suspected Israeli agents go back to Israel, immediately after 911. Apparently it was Michael Chertoff."Chertoff allowed scores of suspected Israeli terrorists and spies to quietly return to Israel . In several cases, Israeli suspects working for phoney moving companies, such as Urban Moving Systems from Weehawken, N.J., were caught driving moving vans which tested positive for explosives. On September 14, Dominic Suter, the owner of the moving company, which was found to be a Mossad front company, fled to Israel after FBI agents requested a second interview.
One group of 5 Israelis was seen on the roof of Urban Moving Systems videotaping and celebrating the destruction of the World Trade Center. These Israeli agents were returned to Israel on visa violations.These Israeli suspects, and others, who had apparently transported explosives in the New York area, were allowed to return to Israel without being properly interrogated or their presence and activities in the United States having been vigorously investigated." (1)What is publicly available about Chertoff's life and his various careers is not comforting, if you care about either law or justice-and it's especially troubling if you demand a depth of character from those who occupy the highest offices in this land. Ah but then this is the Cheney-Bush Era of Empire, so that 'quaint idea' is probably now completely without merit."
Chertoff is credited with authoring the Patriot Act, the 300-plus page blueprint for the modern National Security State; patterned to great extent on the successes of the KGB in the Soviet system. He's admired among his Bush cadres for making sure that government surveillance operates at maximum efficiency. Under his stewardship at the Dept of Justice, the 4th amendment has withered like summer grass. The long-held belief that citizens, have a right to a "reasonable expectation of privacy" has buckled under the demands of "Big Brother" and the new "intrusive" security paradigm."
And: "Chertoff's record of failure at Justice is second only to that of Ashcroft. His 4 year tenure hasn't produced even one identifiable success. (Check out his "obstruction of justice" in the John Walker Lindh case on Democracy Now) Instead, his personal ineptitude and his palpable contempt for the law have only showered more disgrace on the institution of American justice. That probably explains why he's being moved up the bureaucratic dog-pile to the top rung of Homeland Security. In Bush-world "failing upwards" is more commonplace than cowboy boots at a Crawford tent-show." (2)As someone that controls the largest Federal Agency in the US government; the life and accomplishments of Michael Chertoff ought to be available and easy to locate: but that has not been the case. Instead the important details concerning Michael Chertoff's past have been meticulously scrubbed from the net.
The basics are available from Wikipedia but the facts surrounding the depth of his family's involvement in the actual creation of the State of Israel, have disappeared."Chertoff is the co-author, along with Viet Dinh, of the USA PATRIOT Act , signed into law October 26, 2001. As head of the Justice Department's criminal division, he advised the Central Intelligence Agency on the outer limits of legality in coercive interrogation sessions." (3)One of the little known aspects inside all the secrecy surrounding The vile National ID Card, the HOMELAND Security Act, and the shadowy FEMA camps that many believe are about to be used-concerns the other master criminals that Cheney-Bush hired to ensure that Americans will become as completely controlled a population, as were the people of Communist East Germany or the old USSR.For Instance: "This "card" (the National ID Card) was designed for Homeland Security by the former East German STAZI chief, Marcus Wolfe, a master of manipulation and intimidation and Primakov the former head of the KGB in the USSR.
These two former spy chiefs are who really run our SECRET National Interior Spy Service. Bush employed them specifically for what they brought from their communist states - now they decide who lives and who dies in America! These men have not changed, they are who they are, and that's why Bush & the Bandits hired them for HOMELAND Security. If these men appeared for work, in the uniforms of their former States, the public would be outraged, and rightfully so!
How is it that the radical right continues to decry Communism, yet they have allowed Bush to employ top communist counter-intelligence officers to oversee every facet of our lives?" (4)Throughout this long international nightmare there remains the still incomplete tragedy of the insertion of Israel, as a State, into what was once Palestine. This conflicted and war-torn place has been the international flashpoint of privilege over human rights and bondage over freedom for over half a century. Flames and blood from this dispute were ignited by greed and by those dark and destabilizing dreams of Empire that were beginning even before the First World War.
Here's something that one woman adds to the on-going dialogue in Palestine-because what she's found is pivotal to the veracity of claims made by the Zionist extremists that control "Israel" today.This is why the dual citizenship of our Homeland Security Czar is incompatible with his position in government today. The USA is large enough to require that all our highest officials be Americans without dual citizenships, or conflicts of national interest, from any other nation. (5)
References:
(1) Controlled Press Hides Chertoff's Israeli Roots
(2) Falling Upwards the Rise of Michael Chertoff
(3) Michael Chertoff Wikipedia
(4) Our CRIMINAL Justice System
(5) Giving Credit Where Credit is Due
Source: News from the West
Michael Chertoff: The Man & His Star-Crossed Past
Written by Jim Kirwan
Sunday, 26 August 2007
Very few Americans, not directly affected by this man of many faces have no idea, of who really directs the duties of the 180,000 government employees in DHS: Duties that this man now holds in his stained and conflicted hands. It seems that the variety of controversies which have paralleled Michael Chertoff's meteoric rise in government have been allowed to languish in the shadows for far too long. If the public does not soon become familiar with who their Director of Homeland Security really is-then they may live to regret that oversight.
The details of Michael Chertoff's personal history should have disqualified him for high office: but instead his nomination for this job was approved without objection by the Senate."The Senate voted 98-0 to approve Chertoff on February 15. Chertoff, 51, took the oath of office that night in "a private ceremony at the White House."DHS has a $32 billion budget, 180,000 employees, and jurisdiction over immigration, customs and transportation security, the Coast Guard, the Secret Service and the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The question of Chertoff's dual-nationality doesn't seem to have concerned a single U.S. senator.Many have wondered who let the detained suspected Israeli agents go back to Israel, immediately after 911. Apparently it was Michael Chertoff."Chertoff allowed scores of suspected Israeli terrorists and spies to quietly return to Israel . In several cases, Israeli suspects working for phoney moving companies, such as Urban Moving Systems from Weehawken, N.J., were caught driving moving vans which tested positive for explosives. On September 14, Dominic Suter, the owner of the moving company, which was found to be a Mossad front company, fled to Israel after FBI agents requested a second interview.
One group of 5 Israelis was seen on the roof of Urban Moving Systems videotaping and celebrating the destruction of the World Trade Center. These Israeli agents were returned to Israel on visa violations.These Israeli suspects, and others, who had apparently transported explosives in the New York area, were allowed to return to Israel without being properly interrogated or their presence and activities in the United States having been vigorously investigated." (1)What is publicly available about Chertoff's life and his various careers is not comforting, if you care about either law or justice-and it's especially troubling if you demand a depth of character from those who occupy the highest offices in this land. Ah but then this is the Cheney-Bush Era of Empire, so that 'quaint idea' is probably now completely without merit."
Chertoff is credited with authoring the Patriot Act, the 300-plus page blueprint for the modern National Security State; patterned to great extent on the successes of the KGB in the Soviet system. He's admired among his Bush cadres for making sure that government surveillance operates at maximum efficiency. Under his stewardship at the Dept of Justice, the 4th amendment has withered like summer grass. The long-held belief that citizens, have a right to a "reasonable expectation of privacy" has buckled under the demands of "Big Brother" and the new "intrusive" security paradigm."
And: "Chertoff's record of failure at Justice is second only to that of Ashcroft. His 4 year tenure hasn't produced even one identifiable success. (Check out his "obstruction of justice" in the John Walker Lindh case on Democracy Now) Instead, his personal ineptitude and his palpable contempt for the law have only showered more disgrace on the institution of American justice. That probably explains why he's being moved up the bureaucratic dog-pile to the top rung of Homeland Security. In Bush-world "failing upwards" is more commonplace than cowboy boots at a Crawford tent-show." (2)As someone that controls the largest Federal Agency in the US government; the life and accomplishments of Michael Chertoff ought to be available and easy to locate: but that has not been the case. Instead the important details concerning Michael Chertoff's past have been meticulously scrubbed from the net.
The basics are available from Wikipedia but the facts surrounding the depth of his family's involvement in the actual creation of the State of Israel, have disappeared."Chertoff is the co-author, along with Viet Dinh, of the USA PATRIOT Act , signed into law October 26, 2001. As head of the Justice Department's criminal division, he advised the Central Intelligence Agency on the outer limits of legality in coercive interrogation sessions." (3)One of the little known aspects inside all the secrecy surrounding The vile National ID Card, the HOMELAND Security Act, and the shadowy FEMA camps that many believe are about to be used-concerns the other master criminals that Cheney-Bush hired to ensure that Americans will become as completely controlled a population, as were the people of Communist East Germany or the old USSR.For Instance: "This "card" (the National ID Card) was designed for Homeland Security by the former East German STAZI chief, Marcus Wolfe, a master of manipulation and intimidation and Primakov the former head of the KGB in the USSR.
These two former spy chiefs are who really run our SECRET National Interior Spy Service. Bush employed them specifically for what they brought from their communist states - now they decide who lives and who dies in America! These men have not changed, they are who they are, and that's why Bush & the Bandits hired them for HOMELAND Security. If these men appeared for work, in the uniforms of their former States, the public would be outraged, and rightfully so!
How is it that the radical right continues to decry Communism, yet they have allowed Bush to employ top communist counter-intelligence officers to oversee every facet of our lives?" (4)Throughout this long international nightmare there remains the still incomplete tragedy of the insertion of Israel, as a State, into what was once Palestine. This conflicted and war-torn place has been the international flashpoint of privilege over human rights and bondage over freedom for over half a century. Flames and blood from this dispute were ignited by greed and by those dark and destabilizing dreams of Empire that were beginning even before the First World War.
Here's something that one woman adds to the on-going dialogue in Palestine-because what she's found is pivotal to the veracity of claims made by the Zionist extremists that control "Israel" today.This is why the dual citizenship of our Homeland Security Czar is incompatible with his position in government today. The USA is large enough to require that all our highest officials be Americans without dual citizenships, or conflicts of national interest, from any other nation. (5)
References:
(1) Controlled Press Hides Chertoff's Israeli Roots
(2) Falling Upwards the Rise of Michael Chertoff
(3) Michael Chertoff Wikipedia
(4) Our CRIMINAL Justice System
(5) Giving Credit Where Credit is Due
Source: News from the West
CONGRESS: DEALING WITH JEWISH CONTROL OF THE CONGRESS
http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2007_hr/1967executive.html
Recently declassified and released Congressional protocols.
Date: June 9, 1967. The senators contemplate ways to pressure Israel and the Arabs and delve into the question of Jewish power in America.
Secretary Dean Rusk: Well, I do not want to underestimate influence in this situation, but I just want to point out that it is not necessarily decisive when you are talking with countries about what they consider the life and death issues for them.
Senator Bourke Hickenlooper of Iowa: Do we not give tax forgiveness for monies contributed to Israel, which is rather unusual? We could stop that.
Secretary Rusk: I believe contributions to the UJA [United Jewish Appeal] are tax exempt, yes.
The Chairman, J. William Fulbright of Arkansas: That is right. The only country. Do you think you have the votes in the Senate to revoke that?
Senator Clifford Case of New Jersey: Are you in favor yourself?
Senator Hickenlooper: I think we ought to treat all nations alike.
Senator Case: That is correct. But are you in favor of it?
Senator Hickenlooper: As long as we do not give it to other nations, I do not -
The Chairman: The trouble is they think they have control of the Senate and they can do as they please.
Senator Stuart Symington of Missouri: What was that?
The Chairman: I said they know they have control of the Senate politically, and therefore whatever the Secretary tells them, they can laugh at him. They say, “Yes, but you don’t control the Senate.”
Senator Symington: They were very anxious to get every Senator they could to come out and say we ought to act unilaterally, and they got two, three.
The Chairman: They know when the chips are down you can no more reverse this tax exemption than you can fly. You could not pass a bill through the Senate.
Senator Hickenlooper: I do not think you could.
The Chairman: Changing that tax exemption contribution to the UJA. I would bet you ten to one you could not begin to pass a bill You do not believe they could under any circumstances.
Senator Symington: A bill to do what?
The Chairman: To revoke the tax exemption of gifts to the UJA. That is one of their major sources of income. You yourself have pointed out the money they paid for the French arms they got from the U.S.
Senator Symington: Each year the money we give annually for this is less than 1 percent of the cost of Vietnam.
The Chairman: I agree with that.
Senator Hickenlooper: There you go.
The Chairman: But you know very well, you said yourself, that the arms they buy from France are largely paid for by contributions that come from this country.
Senator Symington: Because we would not sell it to them, so instead of selling them the arms…
Senator Albert Gore of Tennessee: Has the President recommended that this be repealed?
The Chairman: No, he has not. I do not wish to make the point except the Secretary is quite correct when he says his leverage on Israel is very limited because of the political situation.
Senator Hickenlooper: I am sorry I brought it up.
Secretary Rusk: I did not say it.
The Chairman: If you did not say it, you do not disagree with it anyway.
Secretary Rusk: I think it should be pointed out though on this tax exempt matter that there are many other organizations, institutions, that would fall into the same principle, private foundations in their expenditures abroad, churches, the voluntary agencies; there are very large sums of money going to foreign countries that are tax exempt in this country as the origin.
Senator Hickenlooper: I do not think it is analogous.
Senator Gore: It is tax deductible; you said tax exempt.
Secretary Rusk: Except the organizations are exempt. Contributions to them are tax deductible.
Senator Cooper: I suggest - it is possible after this thatIsrael may ask that this be removed as a sign of showing they are not absolutely dependent on the U.S.
Recently declassified and released Congressional protocols.
Date: June 9, 1967. The senators contemplate ways to pressure Israel and the Arabs and delve into the question of Jewish power in America.
Secretary Dean Rusk: Well, I do not want to underestimate influence in this situation, but I just want to point out that it is not necessarily decisive when you are talking with countries about what they consider the life and death issues for them.
Senator Bourke Hickenlooper of Iowa: Do we not give tax forgiveness for monies contributed to Israel, which is rather unusual? We could stop that.
Secretary Rusk: I believe contributions to the UJA [United Jewish Appeal] are tax exempt, yes.
The Chairman, J. William Fulbright of Arkansas: That is right. The only country. Do you think you have the votes in the Senate to revoke that?
Senator Clifford Case of New Jersey: Are you in favor yourself?
Senator Hickenlooper: I think we ought to treat all nations alike.
Senator Case: That is correct. But are you in favor of it?
Senator Hickenlooper: As long as we do not give it to other nations, I do not -
The Chairman: The trouble is they think they have control of the Senate and they can do as they please.
Senator Stuart Symington of Missouri: What was that?
The Chairman: I said they know they have control of the Senate politically, and therefore whatever the Secretary tells them, they can laugh at him. They say, “Yes, but you don’t control the Senate.”
Senator Symington: They were very anxious to get every Senator they could to come out and say we ought to act unilaterally, and they got two, three.
The Chairman: They know when the chips are down you can no more reverse this tax exemption than you can fly. You could not pass a bill through the Senate.
Senator Hickenlooper: I do not think you could.
The Chairman: Changing that tax exemption contribution to the UJA. I would bet you ten to one you could not begin to pass a bill You do not believe they could under any circumstances.
Senator Symington: A bill to do what?
The Chairman: To revoke the tax exemption of gifts to the UJA. That is one of their major sources of income. You yourself have pointed out the money they paid for the French arms they got from the U.S.
Senator Symington: Each year the money we give annually for this is less than 1 percent of the cost of Vietnam.
The Chairman: I agree with that.
Senator Hickenlooper: There you go.
The Chairman: But you know very well, you said yourself, that the arms they buy from France are largely paid for by contributions that come from this country.
Senator Symington: Because we would not sell it to them, so instead of selling them the arms…
Senator Albert Gore of Tennessee: Has the President recommended that this be repealed?
The Chairman: No, he has not. I do not wish to make the point except the Secretary is quite correct when he says his leverage on Israel is very limited because of the political situation.
Senator Hickenlooper: I am sorry I brought it up.
Secretary Rusk: I did not say it.
The Chairman: If you did not say it, you do not disagree with it anyway.
Secretary Rusk: I think it should be pointed out though on this tax exempt matter that there are many other organizations, institutions, that would fall into the same principle, private foundations in their expenditures abroad, churches, the voluntary agencies; there are very large sums of money going to foreign countries that are tax exempt in this country as the origin.
Senator Hickenlooper: I do not think it is analogous.
Senator Gore: It is tax deductible; you said tax exempt.
Secretary Rusk: Except the organizations are exempt. Contributions to them are tax deductible.
Senator Cooper: I suggest - it is possible after this thatIsrael may ask that this be removed as a sign of showing they are not absolutely dependent on the U.S.
Sunday, August 26, 2007
LATINO BLACKMAIL
Are we being blackmailed by latinos into allowing illegal mexicans to come to the United States?
NEW YORK - Call it a guilt trip or a cultural awakening, but some Latino filmmakers feel that the controversy over Ken Burns' upcoming World War II documentary has unexpectedly opened doors for their work at PBS.
The maker of "Brown Is the New Green: George Lopez and the American Dream," which airs Sept. 12, said he believed PBS was anxious to air his film before Burns' because "they had egg on their face."
The Lopez film is one of five Latino projects that PBS is airing in the weeks before the start of Burns' "The War" on Sept. 23. Advocates were angered that the Burns epic did not feature the contributions of Latino soldiers, and their protest this spring forced PBS' best-known documentarian to add such material to the film.
The public broadcasting service in August distributed "The Borinqueneers," a documentary about the primarily Puerto Rican 65th Infantry Regiment in the Korean War. In September, PBS is airing a film about World War II veteran Hector P. Garcia, who fought for better treatment of Mexican-Americans; and separate "American Masters" segments on painter Diego Rivera and the artist Orozco.
Include the Sept. 8 edition of the concert series "Austin City Limits" featuring Los Lonely Boys, and that makes it six.
"Now is the time," said Hector Galan, a veteran filmmaker who earned the contract to produce new material for Burns' film. "I think we should seize the moment when it is there. The timing is great."
PBS spokeswoman Lea Sloan said it was unfair to credit the Burns controversy for all of this activity, and noted that PBS already airs more Latino-oriented programming than other mainstream networks. But she did note that the episode caused PBS to work harder to reach out to this rapidly growing part of the population.
The Lopez film talks about how corporate efforts to profit from the Latino market shapes the perception of it. The notion of a Latino or Hispanic people was created by the U.S. government, the film says. The people it defines had simply identified themselves from their nation of origin, like Mexican-Americans.
Lopez talks about his efforts to integrate his work into American society, and how far people have come from the dimwitted comic caricature "Jose Jimenez" in the 1960s.
To a certain degree, "Brown Is the New Green" feels like a primer on Latino society for older white Americans - a big part of PBS' audience.
The documentary was already in the works for PBS before issues were raised about "The War," said Phillip Rodriguez, the filmmaker. Another one of his projects, about Latino influence on politics, was just green-lit by PBS and he's trying to get backing for two more.
"I'm glad for the opportunity for an audience and I'm glad for an opportunity to educate Americans about an increasingly important segment of society," Rodriguez said. "I guess somebody had to get in their face to take this group seriously."
Another filmmaker, Mario Barrera, has been working for four years compiling an oral history of Latino World War II soldiers. Since the Burns issue surfaced, the Los Angeles PBS station KCET-TV has agreed to air his documentary, he said.
Barrera said he had hoped to convince more stations to sign up. But since the Corporation for Public Broadcasting is offering individual PBS stations grants for companion pieces to "The War," many are choosing to make their own.
"I think the individual PBS stations are more interested in the money," he said.
PBS' Sloan, who said the grants range between $1,000 and $10,000, are given to help the individual stations create content unique to their markets.
She noted that PBS was praised three years ago for the series "American Family: Journey of Dreams," which focused on a Latino family. PBS is also close to hiring a diversity director, a position that was approved two years ago, who will highlight programming efforts of interest to different ethnic groups.
"We certainly have paid very special attention to Latino audiences, in part because we feel PBS hasn't been sufficiently recognized for the effort we have put in," she said. "It's made us redouble our efforts."
Both Galan and filmmaker Paul Espinosa said it has often been a struggle in the past to get PBS' attention for films about their community. Espinosa has a 25-year relationship with PBS, for whom he made a series in the 1990s about the U.S.-Mexican War.
He's currently making a film about a 19th Century figure from New Mexico, Padre Martinez, and believes PBS would be a logical destination.
"There's the potential that (the Burns controversy) will have a positive effect," Espinosa said. "I think it's caused a lot of soul-searching on the part of a lot of decision-makers."
Maggie Rivas-Rodriguez, a University of Texas professor who spearheaded the drive to change Burns' film, said she hoped the new attention paid to these projects would not be short-term.
"It's not about political correctness," she said. "It's about historical inclusion."
---
On the Net:
http://www.pbs.org
http://www.DefendtheHonor.org
NEW YORK - Call it a guilt trip or a cultural awakening, but some Latino filmmakers feel that the controversy over Ken Burns' upcoming World War II documentary has unexpectedly opened doors for their work at PBS.
The maker of "Brown Is the New Green: George Lopez and the American Dream," which airs Sept. 12, said he believed PBS was anxious to air his film before Burns' because "they had egg on their face."
The Lopez film is one of five Latino projects that PBS is airing in the weeks before the start of Burns' "The War" on Sept. 23. Advocates were angered that the Burns epic did not feature the contributions of Latino soldiers, and their protest this spring forced PBS' best-known documentarian to add such material to the film.
The public broadcasting service in August distributed "The Borinqueneers," a documentary about the primarily Puerto Rican 65th Infantry Regiment in the Korean War. In September, PBS is airing a film about World War II veteran Hector P. Garcia, who fought for better treatment of Mexican-Americans; and separate "American Masters" segments on painter Diego Rivera and the artist Orozco.
Include the Sept. 8 edition of the concert series "Austin City Limits" featuring Los Lonely Boys, and that makes it six.
"Now is the time," said Hector Galan, a veteran filmmaker who earned the contract to produce new material for Burns' film. "I think we should seize the moment when it is there. The timing is great."
PBS spokeswoman Lea Sloan said it was unfair to credit the Burns controversy for all of this activity, and noted that PBS already airs more Latino-oriented programming than other mainstream networks. But she did note that the episode caused PBS to work harder to reach out to this rapidly growing part of the population.
The Lopez film talks about how corporate efforts to profit from the Latino market shapes the perception of it. The notion of a Latino or Hispanic people was created by the U.S. government, the film says. The people it defines had simply identified themselves from their nation of origin, like Mexican-Americans.
Lopez talks about his efforts to integrate his work into American society, and how far people have come from the dimwitted comic caricature "Jose Jimenez" in the 1960s.
To a certain degree, "Brown Is the New Green" feels like a primer on Latino society for older white Americans - a big part of PBS' audience.
The documentary was already in the works for PBS before issues were raised about "The War," said Phillip Rodriguez, the filmmaker. Another one of his projects, about Latino influence on politics, was just green-lit by PBS and he's trying to get backing for two more.
"I'm glad for the opportunity for an audience and I'm glad for an opportunity to educate Americans about an increasingly important segment of society," Rodriguez said. "I guess somebody had to get in their face to take this group seriously."
Another filmmaker, Mario Barrera, has been working for four years compiling an oral history of Latino World War II soldiers. Since the Burns issue surfaced, the Los Angeles PBS station KCET-TV has agreed to air his documentary, he said.
Barrera said he had hoped to convince more stations to sign up. But since the Corporation for Public Broadcasting is offering individual PBS stations grants for companion pieces to "The War," many are choosing to make their own.
"I think the individual PBS stations are more interested in the money," he said.
PBS' Sloan, who said the grants range between $1,000 and $10,000, are given to help the individual stations create content unique to their markets.
She noted that PBS was praised three years ago for the series "American Family: Journey of Dreams," which focused on a Latino family. PBS is also close to hiring a diversity director, a position that was approved two years ago, who will highlight programming efforts of interest to different ethnic groups.
"We certainly have paid very special attention to Latino audiences, in part because we feel PBS hasn't been sufficiently recognized for the effort we have put in," she said. "It's made us redouble our efforts."
Both Galan and filmmaker Paul Espinosa said it has often been a struggle in the past to get PBS' attention for films about their community. Espinosa has a 25-year relationship with PBS, for whom he made a series in the 1990s about the U.S.-Mexican War.
He's currently making a film about a 19th Century figure from New Mexico, Padre Martinez, and believes PBS would be a logical destination.
"There's the potential that (the Burns controversy) will have a positive effect," Espinosa said. "I think it's caused a lot of soul-searching on the part of a lot of decision-makers."
Maggie Rivas-Rodriguez, a University of Texas professor who spearheaded the drive to change Burns' film, said she hoped the new attention paid to these projects would not be short-term.
"It's not about political correctness," she said. "It's about historical inclusion."
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http://www.DefendtheHonor.org
Friday, August 24, 2007
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