Journalist Sues CIA. . . Again

The FOIABlog reports on my complaint charging a violation of the Freedom of Information Act, in regard to a request for CIA documents about the May, 2005 outbreak of violence in Andijan, Uzbekistan. . .

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Happy Veteran's Day!

On the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, World War I came to an end...we celebrate it today in memory of all veterans. Here's a link to the official Department of Veterans Affairs website.

Friends 4ever?

(White House photo by Eric Draper)

Inside the Borgia Administration...

Friday night's cultural super-day was capped by the Washington National Opera's production of Donizetti's Lucrezia Borgia. The performance starred soprano Sondra Radvanovsky. The Berwyn, Illinois native sang beautifully, a lovely voice in a rather unlovely tragedy about murder by wineglass. Placido Domingo conducted the orchestra, and all the singing sounded first-rate. The stage direction was a bit strange--a distracting homosexual romance had been added to the plot by John Pascoe, in addition to Lucrezia slitting her own throat. His set and costume design featured what looked like fetish wear rather than beautiful clothes. The choreography, by Bulgarian Vladimir Angelov, was unfortunately not good...

But who cares... The music was great, the singing was great, and the story was great. A great show.

OperaLuvr's blog post about Renee Fleming's performance. IonArts review here.

Rachmaninoff in Washington

Before the Pompeii show, someone I know and I had been to a performance of Sergei Rachmaninoff's Sonata for Cello and Piano in G Minor, Opus 19, performed by Sean Neidlinger and Jennifer Yeo at the Arts Club. It was a lovely performance, and both of the musicians were excellent. They are two members of the Sage Chamber Players, and so good that I googled their website, where you may read about upcoming performances.

Pompeii Comes to Washington

Last Friday, someone I know and yours truly took in the National Gallery of Art's Pompeii and the Roman Villa: Art and Culture Around the Bay of Naples. It's a nice show. Not the bordello paintings and priapic satyrs one associates with the ruined resort. Rather highbrow, dealing with Pompeii past, present, and perhaps future...

Not just Las Vegas, Pompeii had been a Martha's Vineyard or Nantucket of ancient Rome. Writers, orators, actors, even philosophers were respected--on display is a mosaic featuring Plato with students beneath a tree. Thoughts of 9/11 came to mind while looking at 19th-century paintings of the disaster by the likes of Joseph Wright of Derby. Photos of the ash-covered bodies re-created in Plaster of Paris likewise evoked the collapse of the World Trade Center. Some of the statues looked surprisingly contemporary--like art deco sculptures by Paul Manship. Painted walls for a dining room turned out to have descendants on display in hearing rooms of the US Capitol. And Sir Derek Jacobi's Masterpiece Theatre-like video orientation brought back the glory days of I, Claudius.

Highly recommended.

Scott Hodes on the Future of the Freedom of Information Act

From FOIA Blog.

Historically, Democratic Presidents (Carter, Clinton) have been much more pro-disclosure than Republican Presidents (Ford, Reagan, Bush, and Bush II). I would expect the Obama administration to be more like the Clinton and Carter FOIA model than that of the current administration.

Initially, I look for the Ashcroft memorandum to be stricken. This memorandum which came out in the Fall of 2001 said that any properly used FOIA exemption would be defended by the Justice Department. It superseded (without expressly stating that it did) the Reno memorandum of 1993 which said even if something could be withheld under a FOIA exemption, agencies should look to make discretionary disclosures of material as long as there was no foreseeable harm in government activities in releasing the material. For instance, privileged material in a document that could be withheld under FOIA exemption 5 should be looked at to see if the material could be released even though legally it could be withheld under FOIA exemption 5--the test was would the release do any foreseeable harm to the government. If the answer was no, the material went. Under current policy agencies don't have to ask, they just defend the withholding. Under the Obama administration I look for a similar foreseeable harm test to return.

I also look for an increased awareness in FOIA programs. FOIA Operations will get greatersupportt from those in charge of agencies. While money will be tight in the new administration, I look for investments in the use of new technology to streamline FOIA Operations making them more efficient and answerable to requesters. Additionally, I think the Department of Justice will provide more guidance in FOIA operations, both legally and procedurally.

Finally, I think agencies will overall be more pro-disclosure. I don't know how to quantify that idea, but I think there is a feeling in many FOIA Offices that they can't release information because the current administration doesn't want them to. I think this will slowly change and some agencies will release information they are now withholding. Again, I can't quantify it nor give specific examples.

How to Get a Job in the Obama Administration...

Go to www.change.gov. Scroll to the "Jobs: Apply Now" link. Fill out the form. Wait for the email...

I just did it. It takes about a minute.

There's also a link to the transition directory.

Coincidentally, at dinner last night, there was a discussion speculating on what Obama would do in foreign policy--especially over whom he might pick as Secretary of State. I mentioned that the only foreign policy expert on Obama's team I had seen in person was Susan Rice, years ago at an event at the National Press Club in relation to the 2004 election. She impressed me at the time as the only panelist who sounded like a normal human being. So, it was interesting to read that she seems to be in charge, according this leaked email from Politico.com:

TO: Obama Foreign Policy Experts
FROM: Tony Lake and Susan Rice
DATE: November 7, 2008
RE: Thank You

We want to thank you, and thank you again, for all that you have done to help elect Barack Obama President of the United States. Your wisdom and expertise have been invaluable. We will remain extremely grateful for your incredibly hard work and for your many personal and collective contributions.

We are obviously entering a new phase now with the transition. The transition will be a separate operation from the campaign, which is now disbanding. So too must our foreign policy expert teams disband.

The transition operation will be brief and comparatively lean. Given the need to complete this work expeditiously and efficiently, please understand that only a limited number of people will be able to support those activities. But, please also be assured that participation in the transition is in no way a prerequisite to, nor an assurance of, being offered any position in the Obama-Biden administration.

For those of you interested in applying for a position in the future administration, a transition website has been set up where you can (and, in fact, must) apply by filling out a form and submitting your resume. It is: www.change.gov. We hope very much that you will apply. You should follow the instructions to indicate your interest in being considered for a position in the government. This is a real website, which will be used to fill important positions in the government below the cabinet level. There will be no other channel through which applications will be accepted. Please also feel free to copy Mona Sutphen who will be tracking your applications at: REDACTED, with any resumes and materials you submit in the official channel.

Finally, and importantly, we ask each of you please do not under any circumstances speak to the press, any foreign officials, or embassies on behalf of the transition or President-elect Obama. Please also do not encourage solicitation of such contacts. We cannot emphasize enough the importance of this request. It would be highly damaging for foreign governments or media to receive information that they believe falsely to represent the views of the President-Elect.

If you receive any inquiries, please refer them to:

Dan Pfeiffer, REDACTED (for press inquiries)

Denis McDonough REDACTED or Mark Lippert REDACTED (for any inquiries from foreign officials and embassies)

Their new email accounts should be active by next week.

Thank you again for all that you have done to help make this historic moment possible.

Susan and Tony

A reminder of the Washington truism not to write anything that you don't want to see in the Washington Post the next day...

BTW, If Google's electronic news clippers are pulling names from blog posts for Obama, I'd like to see Susan Rice as Secretary of State. If not Rice, my other candidate is Bill Richardson--he has experience as UN ambassador, energy secretary, and governor. Richardson might send a strong signal to Latin America that the USA takes anti-American developments in the Western Hemisphere more seriously than President Bush appears to have done...

More information on Obama foreign-policy aide Mark Lippert in this Newsweek article. Wikipedia entry here.

A little bit on Dennis McDonough here. I see from the bio that he worked for Sen. Tom Daschle for years...perhaps Sen. Daschle is in the running for Secretary of State, as well?

Rik Freeman at the Arts Club of Washington, DC

The walls at Friday's Arts Club concert yesterday featured big paintings by Rik Freeman. I liked them, they reminded me of Thomas Hart Benton's murals, full of 1930s intensity, substance, as well as style. Well worth a visit. My favorite is Moses Train.

Goldendoodles.com

From the Goldendoodle website, the breed sounds like a perfect puppy for an Obama White House, IMHO:

The Goldendoodle gets its name from its mixed heritage - golden retriever and poodle. Goldendoodles are a hybrid dog, a first generation cross, and as such they exhibit "hybrid vigour". the term used to describe the burst of fertility, good health and growth that is seen in the progeny when two unrelated breeds are mated.

Goldendoodles were first deliberately bred in North America as a larger version of the popular Cockapoo around the mid 1990s. Their non/light shedding coats and ability to live with families with allergies has made them very popular companions.

W

In addition to taking us on a Chicago Barack Obama tour last weekend, Bob and Mary brought us to a screening of Oliver Stone's W in a Rogers Park arthouse. The film was a little long--one of our guides snored a bit--but overall, thought-provoking and strangely sympathetic. It was a serious attempt to explain the Bush Presidency in the context of an Oedipal struggle between father and son. George H.W. Bush (James Cromwell) is the hero of the story (does anyone remember that his Presidency had big problems?), while George W. Bush was portrayed by Josh Brolin as a prodigal son. Stone took Bush's "I'm the decider" line seriously. In this picture, Dick Cheney (Richard Dreyfuss) is a servile yes man who pulls troops out of Iraq for Bush 41 while he goes all the way to Baghdad for Bush 43--a departure from Washington conventional wisdom that Cheney tells Bush what to do. There's also a glowing depiction of Laura Bush (Elizabeth Banks), and a harsh portrait of Barbara Bush (Ellyn Burstyn, who's really nice in real life, she was kind to me years back when I worked as a PA on one of her TV movies). Brolin's Bush is loveable, which is a nice piece of acting work. He really believes in Jesus, he really prays, he really has malice towards none, he really wants to do what's right. He really cares when he visits wounded soldiers. The tragedy is that W's just not up to the job.

After watching the film, it occurred to me that if Oliver Stone is so kind to Bush now, then perhaps history might be even kinder. After all, for all his mistakes, Bush essentially purged the Republican party of the Pat Buchanan wing and appointed both Colin Powell and Condoleeza Rice Secretaries of State...in a sense, paving the way for Barack Obama's run for the White House.

Here's a link to Oliver Stone's MySpace page.

What Next for Obama?

The election is over. The transition has begun.

All Washington wonders this morning what Obama will do next. His transition headquarters is already furnished and ready for business, thanks to the acting administrator of the GSA. Who will fill the cubicles there--and who will get the 3,000 political patronage jobs in the plum book (aka "United States Government Policy and Supporting Positions")--are questions still to be answered. Only one thing is certain:

Texas is out, Chicago is in.

Why Obama Won...

It was the youth vote, according to This 'n That:

With the aid of the Hispanic vote in Colorado, New Mexico, and Nevada, Barack Obama becomes the 44th President of the United States. He is also the first African American who will reside in the White House on Pennsyvania Avenue come 20 January 2009. Election 2008 was far from being a repeat of the 2000 and 2004 elections that were stained by controversies about hanging chads and insinuations of corrupt voting practices in Florida in 2000 and Ohio four years later.

Barack Obama began to build a commanding lead of electoral votes soon after polls began to close on the east coast and never faltered. Once Pennsylvania turned a dark shade of blue, a hotly contested state along with Ohio and Florida, a win for Barack Obama had become a near certainty. And then Florida and Ohio gave up their electoral votes to the popular democratic candidate, two states that had put current President George Bush over the top in 2000 and 2004 respectively.

Change has occurred. Young voters below the age of thirty turned out to vote in large numbers. Hence, the face of the voting public has also changed. No longer do the faces resemble over thirty, white, middle and upper middle class faces that have essentially lived in a vacuum of among their own kind. Young voters of today have been and are constantly exposed to, and intermingle with varied groups of people of varied races, ethnic and religious groups. They exchange thoughts and ideas about the current state of global affairs. They are far from being nationalistic by any stretch of the imagination. What has empowered the youth of today to be more curious, informed and eager to participate in order to make a difference, a change, is access to the internet. It is a fast and efficient way of accumulating information. Some of it not all that accurate. Still their faith in what they read and visualized online never caused them to waiver in their support of the man who they believed could and would bring about the kind of change they want to see. They genuinely care about quality of life they desire to live in the next four years and possibly beyond.

I Voted...

...in person, at my local polling place, on Election Day. As the old advertising jingle used to say; "The Only Way to Fly!" Here's an excerpt from Hank Steuver's defense of this tradition from today's Washington Post:

For now, the "I Voted" sticker remains gloriously the same. Oh, some jurisdictions may dress it up -- Prince William's sticker is much jazzier than the District's simple white circle with the red "X" in the box -- but the message is clearer than ever: I kick it old school. I waited in line with everyone else on the appointed day, because "everyone" is the whole idea. The "I Voted" sticker has been around a long time, at least five election cycles. (A Florida manufacturer claims to have been making "the original" version since 1986, but it probably goes back further.)

The District of Columbia Voter's Guide showed up several days ago in our mail, and on the front cover was a cartoon of a ballot and a pencil holding hands and jumping happily. There was something rudimentary and childlike, almost Hello Kitty about them. It made it feel like social studies class. It's dorky cool, more cool than watching Kirsten Dunst vote early. "You complete us," read the cute words beneath the Pencil and the Ballot, in a retro '70s-style italic. What followed was 57 sober pages of instructions, rules, sample ballots, statements from candidates and long lists of potential advisory neighborhood commissioners.

There's so much to love about the standing part today, amid all the drab beige, taking in the smell of someone else's coffee, rereading the entire newspaper, stuck in the line of voters that doesn't seem to move but, in fact, does. Then comes the sticker.

What a wonderful and boring thing, voting together.

Barack Obama's Baby Pictures

And more, like this one from his prep school, on the Chicago Tribune website today.

The Huxtable Effect

Forget the "Bradley Effect." Alisa Valdes-Rodrigues argues in this article that the key to the 2008 Presidential election may be the "Huxtable Effect" created by Bill Cosby's TV sitcom.

My Tour of Barack Obama's Chicago Neighborhood

Just came back from Chicago, where I learned that Obama lives in an old Jewish neighborhood named "Kenwood." Here are some photos from the walking tour we got from our friends Bob and Mary...

In front of Barack Obama's house, with someone I know:

From Chicago Barack Obama Tour

The shul across the street from Obama's house, the KAM Isaiah Israel Temple :

From Chicago Barack Obama Tour

Our tour guides in front of Obama's house:

From Chicago Barack Obama Tour

Yours truly in front of the home of William Ayers, Jr. and Bernadine Dohrn:

From Chicago Barack Obama Tour

Coffee and grits at Valois Cafeteria, where Barack Obama has eaten many meals:

From Chicago Barack Obama Tour

Yours truly in front of the Valois Cafeteria (a Radio France International reporter was doing interviews inside):

From Chicago Barack Obama Tour

Yours truly in front of the Hyde Park Hair Salon, where Obama gets his haircuts:

From Chicago Barack Obama Tour

Inside the Hyde Park Hair Salon, with European TV crews:

From Chicago Barack Obama Tour

The HQ of Jesse Jackson's "Operation PUSH" (in a former synagogue):

From Chicago Barack Obama Tour

For more background on Obama's neighborhood, someone I know who took the tour with me sent links to these articles from The Chicago Tribune and The Star.

Vote for Obama...

I saw the ad last night...good enough for me--especially Obama's pledge to finish the fight against Al Qaeda and the Taliban, as well as rebuild the American military. The rally left me flat. I think he's better talking to the camera than speechifying to crowds. Luckily, that's what the President needs to do most.

Two items not mentioned in the ad I'd like to see Obama push for: I hope he ends "contracting out" in both military and civilian sectors (no more "permatemps" or mercenaries)--as well as reinstates usury laws, which once upon a time put caps on interest rates for things like credit cards and "payday loans" to reduce bankruptcies, which would directly benefit working Americans.

The World's Smartest Beagle?

Someone I know saw this on Althouse, and I couldn't resist reposting it here:

Agustin Blazquez on the Problems of Cuban Cinema in Exie

THE WALLS ENCIRCLING THE CUBAN FILMMAKERS IN EXILE © 2008 ABIP
Speech by Agustin Blazquez at the VII Annual Congress of the New York Cuban Cultural Center at the New York Film Academy on Saturday, October 25, 2008.
Translated with the collaboration of Jaums Sutton.

My name is Agustin Blazquez. I write and make documentaries about Cuba. I was born in Cardenas, Matanzas, Cuba and grew up in the towns of Coliseo and Limonar, and later on I lived in Havana. In 1967, I unwittingly became a member of what I call “the most openly hated minority in the U.S.”

Even though ours is the most prosperous minority in the U.S., we are politically incorrect. It is all right to humiliate and insult us politically and nothing happens – certainly, no one ever apologizes.

Like the “military circles” technique that Castroites used in the Escambray and Los Organos mountains for almost seven years to crush the Cuban democratic insurgency, the same technique is being used by the prevalent left in the U.S. against the Cuban filmmakers in exile.

Crushing democracy is difficult there and here. It’s still not completely crushed there after 50 years and is certainly strong as ever in the hearts of the exiles here. We continue riding, taking our Don Quixote quest wherever we can.

Since my arrival to the U.S. in 1967 I was surprised to see on TV and the written press what was being said about Cuba. And surprised by the sympathies of school teachers about the Cuban revolution. I began to understand the massive ignorance of our reality.

Soon I realized that as an exile I still faced that formidable enemy, Fidel Castro, but also the press and the U.S. academic world.

Beginning in 1968 I began to write letters to the mainstream media, trying to clarify their errors and guide them to sources of information where they could find the accurate reality of Cuba. After years of receiving only silence as their reply, I decided to write articles. But not directed to the media—it become obvious that the truth about Cuba was not what they were interested in.

I knew I needed to write to the American people – a people who have shown compassion for those repressed. My audience was certainly not Cubans, because we know very well the story because of our firsthand experience in Cuba. We have chosen to live in the U.S., therefore our fight must be focus to the American public opinion that is so misinformed and mislead about survival in the surrealism of Castroland.

With the invaluable collaboration and dedication of one American, Jaums Sutton, who has been editing my articles and who later overcame the annoying technical aspects of making documentaries, more than 300 articles and six documentaries saw the light. The first documentary, COVERING CUBA was premiered at the American Film Institute at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC in November 1995.

The circles of the U.S. left have been getting tighter than the U.S. Embargo. In August 2004 the American Film Institute rejected my third documentary of the series about the case of Elian Gonzalez because it considered it to be “too controversial.” However, they didn’t have objection to instead show Michael Moore’s documentary Fahrenheit 9/11.

The preferred prejudiced predilection for Moore is not just monetary. He belongs to the prevalent reactionary left in the U.S. that control the worlds of the information media, the cultural and academic elites of this nation.

It was during the Elian affair that this hatred and resentment against us was clearly demonstrated through derogative epithets in the editorial commentaries and articles (including by Michael Moore), political cartoons (like the ones of the late Herblock in The Washington Post) and TV reports about Cuban exiles presented in a negative light to the public opinion in the U.S.

The radical encircling rejection against the Cuban American exile filmmakers is easy: just declares as right-wingers, Batista supporters and all that repertoire of negative epithets openly dedicated to us by the mainstream media and the cultural and academic elites in the U.S. I don’t think the majority of us are like that. At least in my case I am an Independent.

The Cuban American filmmakers in exile are mainly rejected from film festivals – for as long as we present the reality of the Cuban tragedy. Let’s be clear: if we do something that favors the Castro regime, then, they open the doors. That’s why I don’t even bother to send my documentaries to film festivals, because first, they steel my fee money and second, they reject it.

I am very straight in my principles, therefore, why should I patronize to our own detractors? So, I only go to film festivals when I am invited.

As a writer and filmmaker in the U.S., I have plenty of freedom to make a film or to write whatever I want. I am not censured to do what I please. But, the thing is that with their cunning “gentlemen’s agreement” of rejecting or simply ignoring what we have to say, they are censuring our message and not allowing it in the form of films, documentaries, books or articles to reach the American public.

In other words we are effectively blocked. It is a real blockade as effective as Castro’s blockade against information and popular incentive in his fiefdom.

Therefore, the mainstream media and the cultural and academic elites are using the same Castro techniques against us in the U.S.

We are also rejected from grants since the majority of these institutions have been effectively infiltrated by those elements limping from the left leg. So we don’t have much support for our projects and we have to end up using money of our own pocket, our initiative, our dedication and doing the work “for the love of art” – in this case our love for freedom, democracy, justice and human rights.

Also – unfortunately – we don’t have much support from our own exile community. In my opinion we still haven’t learned to fight using the arms that our documentary and fictional film productions offer.

In addition to the cases of censure of Nestor Almendros – who I knew in Paris in 1965 – and Jimenez Leal, there is the case of Leon Ichaso with his film Bitter Sugar that was rejected and ignored by Hollywood. Ichaso had to do it with a very low budget. But, he was able to produce an extraordinary production with great acting and photography and a clear presentation of reality. And the case of Andy Garcia’s film The Lost City that suffered due to a lack of funds. Where are the rich Cuban exiles when there is work to be done?

By talking a lot in Miami or in New Jersey this wall that encircles us will not be broken.

The images can bring our message further than our words to each other. We need from our community the same support that the left offers to Michael Moore.

Our productions cost money and if our own community doesn’t help, who is going to do it?

For my seventh documentary of the series COVERING CUBA a non-profit corporation was founded. Its name is UNCOVERING CUBA EDUCATIONAL FOUNDATION (UCEF)*. Since November 2007 to date we have a total of $2,093.70! You can laugh.

Well, this is better than nothing. However, most of Cuban Americans exile filmmakers are on the same train as I am. So I ask you, what can you do with that?!

But, for now, I continue doing the work I feel compelled to do.

© 2008 ABIP