Flashmob

Ah, Seattle. I lived there long enough to cherish many aspects of the city, but if you want to know about the creative atmosphere of a city, look at this video.

Generally speaking, flashmobs are great. The come, the do something, they disappear. I am so far removed from hip and cool that I would have no clue how these things happen, but what I do know is when any sort of flashmob is choreographed and has its own Michael Jackson impersonator, it is boring by nature.

Which speaks volumes about the art scene in Seattle. I was never bowled over by any art generated in Seattle. I saw a lot and I just can not remember a single mind blowing experience.

Having spent the last few years traveling around the country and interviewing great artists in their studios I am often reminded that to create great art, you have to spend a lot of time working on creating great art. It does not just drop off your brush, it takes skill, time and devotion. What I saw in the Northwest was often sloppy, misguided and boring. This video is a perfect example of Seattle art, not great, now inspired, not original and completely forgettable.

Updates galore

The New York Times is reporting that Microsoft has hired someone to help the monster of bad software find a way to get a grip on Google, they don't say it, but I will, nice move, in 1999. The boneheads who run Microsoft quickly grew fat and slow, in parallel with their terrible software and have yet to go on a diet.

Also in the Times, and this is kind of scary, Freedom Communications preps for bankruptcy. Now, if you are an American, the concept of any company called Freedom Communications going bankrupt sounds like the end of the world as we know it. Don't fret, this is just one of those right wing companies that thrive in places with fake boobs, lavish swimming pools and unnecessary tanning salons.

Democrats win in Japan, beating the Liberal Democrats. Wait, what?

Anyone else notice how newspapers and magazines always have a story on "the next shoe dropping in the recession?" Well, the Wall Street Journal has a story on the next shoe dropping, and this time it is real estate. That's right, the WSJ had to dig deep to find this story. Does anyone still read the WSJ?

The Financial Times reports that the Federal Reserve is making money on the bailout. So, the Fed bailed out badly run banks and insanely run insurance companies to the tune of 700 billion. These companies survive and pay back the bailout and now the government is pocketing some cash? This is good news, yes? Well, kind of. The banks continue to be run by greedy idiots and AIG survives with the worst business practices in history. Next bailout, maybe congress will think of regulating idiocy.

Wild fires in California continue. The states governor, almost finished with the states massive garage sale, declares a state of emergency. For a state almost out of all cash, who is paying the fire fighters?

The G-20

Pittsburgh was selected to host the G-20 summit last May. This may seem a strange choice, since many people still think of Pittsburgh as an acid rain infested city, troubled by a dying steel culture and decaying industries fleeing to better tax exempt offers. That may have been true in the 80's, but Pittsburgh is knee deep in redesigning itself into a world class intellectual and manufacturing marketplace.

Robert Gibbs, the presidents mouthpiece, had this to say about Pittsburgh, "Pittsburgh today serves as a model for economic and environmental transformation in the United States and abroad. The city has reinvented itself by building a balanced, innovation-driven economy based on its strengths in advanced manufacturing, financial services, information and communications technologies, health care and life sciences, education and research, and energy and environmental solutions."

What the world will see when the news crews and the reporters flock to the city later this month is a city that is beautiful, charming and not just a little bit racist. If you happen to check public comment boards in the city there is ample use of the N word. If you look at divisions in various neighborhoods many are broken up by race and income, which is not unusual in American Cities. I lived for many years in Seattle and you ca not honestly say there is not a serious racial divide in that liberal wasteland.

So, as the world prepares to come to Pittsburgh to talk economics, let us all remember than no city is pure when it comes to race. No city is clean when it comes to environmental pollution and certainly no city is perfect as we all try to move forward in what is an unpredictable time.

Pittsburgh is certain to represent America to the world, warts and all.

September creeps in

I am dedicating September to focusing like a laser on the upcoming G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh. I have been hired to shoot video of the summit, so around the 24th or so live, or almost live, video updates will be posted here. Until then, I will be finding some interesting side subjects from the upcoming meeting of the worlds economic leaders to focus on.

Again with the fires

Time Lapse Test: Station Fire from Eric Spiegelman on Vimeo.

I grew up in Southern California, something I am not proud of, nor ashamed of, it just is something. One of the things I remember from my childhood was the fires. It was almost like a seasonal change, end of summer, start of school, beginning of the fire season.

As I got a bit older it became custom to look out the window at the hills of the Los Padres Forest and watch for smoke. The fires would generally come within 10 miles of my little town in the hills, but it never burned anything that was considered civilized.

The above video shows very well what it all looks like. Notice the houses? And the smoke? Nothing changes, the houses will still be there, the trees in the background will burn. A cycle continues, which is why they are cycles and not unique events.

I know the deeply disturbed, or religious, like to put more into the meaning of things like great floods or disturbing fires than truly exist, but then that is why they are deeply religious and disturbed, often in the same brain. Fires happen naturally, sometimes, and sometimes they happen because someone is irresponsible, or something else altogether. Fires happen, that much is safe to say.

Now as many people know, California is broke. The state is bordering on bankruptcy. Everyone wants to find blame, there is a fascinating story at NPR about the high cost of prisons, but that is just one problem. Back when I was a child the greedy and stupid ran a initiative that would limit the amount people would pay in property taxes. Nothing gets the electorate as hot and horny as the idea of cutting taxes, even if it meant ruining schools and damaging roads. People love to cut their taxes. People can be retarded, even on a statewide level.

So the proposition passed, of course, they always do. What were once the best schools and best public college system in the country fell on its face, so to speak. The colleges remain a joke and the public schools are damaged beyond repair. How did this happen? First, you can not get top notch anything in America without paying for it, hell it's what we always say to one another, "you get what you pay for." That is true, and it is especially true in education.

California taxpayers wanted to pay less and keep a high level of services. They also wanted those pesky criminals off the streets for a good long time. Of course, they did not want to pay for that either, they just wanted them off the streets, which were crumbling anyway because, again, cut taxes, lose services. Simple.

So, the schools falter, the prisons fill, the infrastructure crumbles and no one wants to pay more in taxes.

So, if you do not want to pay for anything, it takes a genius to figure out how to spend the money you do have. It is called priorities and everyone with a family knows how you must learn about priorities in budgeting. California pays an average of 40 thousand dollars a year per prisoner. California pays an average of 5 thousand dollars a year per student. This is called priorities. For the good people of California, it is more important to pay to keep criminals off the streets than it is to educate possible future criminals on the best way to stay out of jail. Brilliant.

I am going to get back to this point in a future blog, because there is something wrong that is deeper than greed taxpayers, locking up criminals for extended times, choking public education until it is worthless and paying for healthcare for the elderly, while letting children suffer.

In the meantime, the beautiful state of California is burning, again. I wonder if fire is like government waste. The priority is always to fight todays fire and never to prepare for tomorrows. Or possibly, and this would take brilliance, find the reason that these fires return season after season and find out a way to avoid the majority of them. In the past, when I was a child, the worst of the fires always seemed to be started by three things, someone have some sort of accident, causing sparks to ignite dry brush, a hayseed throwing a lit cigarette into the dry weeds and a dimwit leaving a camp fire burning. I am sure there were fires started by mother nature, but my memory is that accidental human failings started the majority of the fires when I was a child. Seems like there might be a solution right there. Possibly limit human contact with fire danger areas during the driest time of the year.

I am just a guy with a computer, what do I know. What I do remember, and what the above video shows, it sometimes these fires can be sexy, beautiful and inspiring in ways that seem almost pornographic.

Lingering recession

A friend recently explained to me why he had such a crappy TV. He said, and I quote, "I can't afford a new one."

He is the problem, right there and if you email me, I will forward you all his contact information. This sort of irresponsibility must be stopped, pronto.

"Wait, you are not spending money on a new TV because you don't have the cash?" I asked.

"No, I bought a new bike and I am strapped."

And so it went. Excuses excuses, one right after the other, mortgage payments, car repair, a gift for his wife. Jesus I kept thinking, he is the reason and should I tell him? Well, should I god?

Dammit, this country has been built on people spending money they did not have and for the first time in recent memory I was talking to one of the people ruining America. He might as well have been a financial terrorist.

What a unique idea, not spending money that you don't have.

When anyone asks me why the recession will linger, I am going to point to my friend and tell them, people are not spending money they do not have. It sounds so simple. In fact, it is.

During the filming of Deregulating Greed I spent a day at the FDR museum and library in Hyde Park. The curator there was walking me through some of the amazing historical photos and documents and one of the things he pointed out was how people relied on actual banks because that was where their money was stored. Again, kick me in the face, actual cash money was actually stored someplace. And in 1929 through 1933 these "banks" were failing faster than a Ben Silverman sitcom. People did not trust the banks because when the closed, the money was gone. No FDIC, no insurance program of any sort.

When FDR got into office one of the first things he did was close banks and take a quick accounting of options. He and congress created the FDIC as a way to bolster support for the ailing banking systems. As the countries finances began to gain trust, people would return, investing money. Keep in mind, back in those days, there was not an industry giving people credit cards to use whenever they wants on purchases of want, not need.

Imagine such a time.

My republican friends

Foreclosures for you

There have been a series of serious articles in the New York Times over the past week or so on a small town in Southern California that is drastically changing because of the drop in real estate values and the increasing number of foreclosures.

What is often written about is how people got in over the heads in the go-go days of the early 2000's. There are stories galore about how stupid we all were, not just as individuals, but certainly at bankers and mortgage loan experts. I have often come down on the side of the average person in this battle of who is really responsible. First off, I will continue to argue that there remain a large number of stupid bankers in charge of the nations banking system. These inbred Yale and Harvard grads yield enormous power over a system they not only designed, but one they also ruined.

That said, who in their right mind would turn down a loan for half a million dollars if you were earning 30 grand a year? I know I wouldn't and my guess is there are very few who did or would. It will be almost impossible to describe to our children how this happened. No where in history has there been a time when the money changers were so stupid. You can never underestimate a greedy persons motivations. This is why I know at least 3 close friends who have fallen for con men scams.

You take an average street con, some three card monty trick, and you give that same sense of free money thinking to people walking into their local bank, and what you get is average American people buying homes, or taking out home equity lines, that they could never afford to pay back, nor could their home handle the burden of such astronomical new debt.

In the Times series there are a number of people who purchased these regular homes in a section of Southern California that was not that great. The prices were reasonable, 150 thousand or so, and people bought their homes and led their lives. Then, as banks could not give money away fast enough, these same people could apply for loans, and shady home appraisers (in on the game from day one) would estimate the value of these simple homes at twice or three times real value. Again, who could turn down a low interest rate loan for a home they purchased at 150,000? You buy the home for 150,000, maybe put down 10 percent, so you own 140,000 on a 30 year mortgage. Then you find out your home is magically worth 300,000. That means, you could walk into a large, stupid bank, and pull out 150,000 in cash. Withonly 10, grand down that you pulled together to purchase the home.

Step back from how retarded this all is and imagine yourself in the same situation. We can all use more money at our disposal. This scam offered that, in piles of clean cash for anyone who basically knew how to sign their name.

So what happens when reality knocks on your door? You find yourself using your home equity line of credit to pay a mortgage you can't even come close to affording, knowing in the back of your mind though, that if the worst happens, you could still probably sell your home for a profit, because you see the prices of homes just continue to increase.

Then the prices stop increasing. Then they begin to decrease, and employers start to lay off workers. And banks, still run but some of the stupidest people ever to wear a suit, start closing off the home equity money. Then that mortgage payment, that went from an affordable 1000 dollars a month is now 2800 and you are broke. Goodbye house, goodbye job, goodbye.

Career clowns

If anyone wants to know what is wrong with corporate America, they could have tailed me yesterday and learned a great deal. First, since moving here I continue to make films as my first source of income and while that is starting to provide serious work, before everything began to click I took a job with a large corporation, doing some field work in the region.

The first thing I realized about working for big corporations, something I had been able to resist my entire career, was that there was never a sense any job needed to get done quickly. I have always worked with a deadline, as a journalist it would be to an hour - a story must be done and edited by 5PM. You get a deadline, you meet it. I also have had self imposed deadlines as a filmmaker, people pay me to finish a film, not talk about it. I have always taken a certain amount of pride in not only always meeting deadlines, but also communicating that my plan was to actually meet the agreed upon deadlines.

So, imagine my surprise when I was offered a serious job with a large corporation that would have some sort of deadlines, but a deadline that could never quite be communicated, not could the actual job be clearly stated. What made me feel more secure was that a West Coast trainer was going to fly in for two weeks for hands on, field training. I figure I could handle almost anything with hands on, field training. Heck, I am confident I could pilot a shuttle with two weeks of serious training.

In early August the "trainer" showed up, disheveled, unshaven, badly dressed and unprepared. When I say unprepared, I mean, no training manual, no field training plans and no serious attempt to train me to do anything of substance. We sat in my living that first day we met, he mumbled through a couple of hours of corporate jargon and he left. The next day I got more of the same and I made up some appointment and asked him to leave after two hours. His communication skills were just a little bit better developed than that of a caveman of adequate intelligence.

After that initial training, we did have a couple of chances of field training. Even though he was staying in a nearby hotel, we did not meet again until there was a field training opportunity. When we met at the job site, his slow movements and lack of any sort of ability to explain what we were doing convinced me that this two weeks of training would be wasted. Lucky for me, there was only one other call in the entire time he was here and that one overlapped with another job I had, so I actually showed up to watch him cleaning up. Fantastic.

He was gone and I began to get calls from corporate, or more honestly, emails from corporate reps. They would send me somewhere, often sending an address and contact number of a local client. At first I would show up expecting the client to know why I was there, but that soon proved to be a dumb move since not a single client has proven to know anything about a call that had sent me to their business. Again, bad communication from the top all the way to the bottom.

Yesterday was the day that finally proved to me that no only was the entire company set up to deal with idiots and meth addicts, but that the concept of showing up, fixing a problem and being done was completely foreign to them. I showed up on the site at 8AM, did some troubleshooting, spoke with a tech in Georgia, we found the problem, fixed it and by 10 I was done except for calling corporate, having them run a test on a computer and leaving. I did not leave until 1:30 in the afternoon. Spending more than 2 hours on hold at one point while some pointy headed corporate idiot ran tests, of maybe did not, because I was on hold and had not a clue as to what was actually going on.

This is the point. Bad communication, bad training, bad corporate practices and a complete disrespect to the concept of deadlines and getting in, getting a job complete and getting out. I was steamed at the waste of time, because in the end, after more than two hours on hold, nothing changed, all was well and I was home.

I have thought a lot about contacting the big corporate office. I wanted to offer to make a film for them for training, because their training now is not training, it is a waste of weeks. I wanted to professionally pitch a concept where a a film actually shows what a job is and how to get things done. While this sounds logical, my latest experience working with a corporation shows how little real communication gets accomplished, how little care is taken for real training and how little an employees time is valued.

Speaking of value, as of this date, I have no clue what I could actually be getting paid. Everytime I have talked to the people who hired me, they come up with the most amazing nonsense on how pay is set. I do not sense that they do this out of any reason to hide, I think they actually are not sure. That's right, I have been working for a company that can not, or will not, in plain english, tell me exactly what I can expect to be paid.

Any guesses on how long I will be working for this company?

A video

Since this is the new blog, I wanted to test and see how some of the clips from Deregulating Greed (the movie) show up on this platform.

The G-20 is coming to town

The G-20 is coming to Pittsburgh in a month and already the city is planning to triple the police force for the two day conference. I photographed the WTO meeting in Seattle, where police were dressed in their best storm trooper outfits and absolutely used any excuse possible to tear gas just about anyone in their general area.

A friend in Pittsburgh said he is worried because the police have a tendency to shoot first and ask questions later. In Seattle the police, once given the go-ahead, would fire off canisters of tear gas in every direction and stood stoically around the streets, both intimidating and threatening anyone with an opinion.

There are rumors around that this meeting could be worse, and why not? The world economy is still in a funk, the richer nations are trying to sell the idea that the recession is in recovery, but not everyone agrees (see the Krugman quote in the previous post). What we can all agree on is that the world economy has taken a beating over the last 18 months and this meeting will certainly be giving many of the worlds largest economy a chance to talk, plan and do press in a setting that is rich with irony.

Pittsburgh was once the leader in steel production. The banks of the rivers in the region remain spotted with companies associated with the old economy, some still functioning, many just husks of fabricated metal, rusting and dying, much like the industry they represent. Pittsburgh is also a city on the move, from large thriving colleges to an assortment of new jobs in the new economy. Thus, much like Seattle in the 90's all prepped to host the WTO, Pittsburgh now stands to take the world stage at a time when both the city and the world are looking to the future.

Protests are being planned and the general outlook, is that there could be some interesting confrontations. I have some cameras and hopefully a credential and as things begin to heat up, I hope to have images and footage from the streets.

Between hell and heaven

While filming Deregulating Greed I spent a few weeks emailing Paul Krugman, the economist who writes a column for the New York Times and picks up Nobel Prizes when he has some extra time.

Professor Krugman was more than willing to be interviewed for the film. The only real problem was finding time that fit both of our schedules. In the end I could only squeeze in an esteemed economist from a New England college. Mr. Krugman and I never got our chance to sit down and discuss the future of the American/World economy.

This morning on ABC professor Krugman spoke out about just where the economy is today. Since the Fed continues to try its best to paint a rosy picture of a recovery in bloom, and while thousands continue to lose homes and jobs, there seems to be a reasonable expectation that we are neither recovering or about to jump off into the abyss. Here is what the good professor had to say this morning.

"We've got a problem with terminology because we usually say either the economy is in recession or the economy is recovering. Either you're in hell or you're in heaven. And the trouble is we're actually in purgatory. We're actually in a situation almost for sure GDP is growing; almost for sure the business cycle leading committee will eventually decide the recession ended this summer. But almost surely also we're still losing jobs. The unemployment rate is going to continue to rise. So we're in that infamous jobless recovery state."

That'll cost you

I have a doctors appointment on Tuesday. Because this doctor sees people at 7 PM, the last time I was there I was able to waltz in and have some regular tests done to make sure I am healthy.

A few years ago I had an issue with my brain. For months I would find myself in a variety of doctors offices, or more accurately, doctors offices waiting rooms. This happened in Seattle, but it could have been anywhere. I would show up early for the testing and I would be shuffled to a waiting room, often in the cancer ward screening area. For the first part of these tests, I always felt out of place, because I had all my hair and was in decent health. The others waiting did not usually look so happy.

What we all had in common was the sense that this waiting room was a place for us to get our thoughts together, a time to focus on the reason we were all there, waiting. Not a single time was I led back to a doctor or testing procedure anywhere near the time that was scheduled. I am imagining that every other patient had the same experience. Really, when you think about it, how often is anyone on time?

Which brings me to the above link (click on the title). Basically Paul McCrudden (ironic name if ever there was one) is billing companies of all sorts for his time. He has even received a check for one of his bills and of course, he has been billed for the time spent reading his bill to another business. First, I like the idea of putting a value on time spent waiting. I also like the idea that there are probably some businesses so accustomed to paperwork, that they would naturally just pay the statement. Now, I am no longer visiting medical facilities on a daily/weekly basis, but it got me thinking of the days spent waiting in waiting rooms.

Which also got me thinking of all the times I have been somewhere, waiting to interview someone, or talking on the phone to an idiot from almost any company, and wondering how much time I am expected to sit on hold while an outsourced knuckle dragger finishes off his donut or yogurt.

Recently I was interviewing a lawyer and at some point, I asked him how much he charges a client for calling him with a question. It all depends, he said, but his hours are broken up into tenths. Which means that at the very least you are charged for 6 minutes for any sort of contact. He charges 300 dollars an hour, so that 6 minutes of calling your attorney to ask if you should wear a suit and tie to a deposition costs you 30 dollars.

Why do lawyers charge such high fees for their services? Because they can. Trust me, if you were a prostitute, you too would like to charge 300 dollars an hour, although less likely would be the 6 minute minimum, if you know what I mean. But this has all got me thinking, maybe it is time that most people who find others wasting their valuable time, set up some sort of billing system. You plug in the time, the persons contact information, and some computer somewhere sends out a monthly billing statement.

This is not a business plan I am going to develop, but if one does develop, I will certainly be the first customer, sitting in their cluttered waiting room, waiting my turn to sign up and start the process.

Cashing out clunkers

The New York Times is reporting that many auto dealers have ended the Cash for Clunkers program before this mondays deadline. This may be why so many uninformed loud mouths have been screaming during healthcare debates with congress during the August recess. Sure, these two programs are unrelated, but the distrust people have in any government program leaks into any proposal that would add a new program to the populace.

Let me explain. I think the Cash for Clunkers program has been brilliant. In short, you get people to trade in cars that get bad gas mileage for cars that get good gas mileage. You remove guzzling and polluting cars from the road and people drive off in safe and more fuel efficient autos. The environment wins, car makers win, buyers win, dealers win. Opps, OK, maybe dealers don't win so much.

See, what has been happening is that dealers front the clunker traders the money to buy the new car and then send in a boatload of paperwork to some know-nothing DC plutocrat who cares less about paying out the billions owed to dealers. Keep in mind, many of the dealers have just barely been hanging on for the past year while the economy was almost flushed down the toilet by idiotic bankers and stock traders. So, the dealers did not have a lot of money to just loan out while waiting for the payback due from the government.

So, a fairly perfect program got laid low by the slow movements of some government hack who is making sure all the T's are crossed and the paperwork is read very closely. Anyone who has ever dealt with one of these self important knob-jobs knows that many in the government take particular pride in dragging out even the most simple process. It can be infuriating.

This is exactly where the healthcare debate gets bogged down by reality. I personally do not believe the healthcare industrial complex should be allowed to continue. The greed motives make it hard for any insurer to really care about the long term health of the insured. In fact, having gone through a long drawn out healthcare nightmare of my own, I an attest to the whims of an uneducated, non-medical office drone making important decisions on my life based solely on some accountants trickery.

So, when people talk about changes to the countries healthcare, if they had trust in government programs that work, they might be willing to listen to a plan that would save everyone money and insure everyone in a competent manner. But the problem is, as Cash for Clunkers has proven, is that given the chance, government officials are just as stupid and self serving as their private sector friends. Even a simple plan like giving dealers money for taking clunkers off the road became bogged down in red tape and silly paperwork. You know that the reams of paper that every dealer has had to fill out will just be thrown away in a month or so in some government dumpster.

Imagine if the Cash for Clunkers program had a website where dealers logged in, sent in the information on cars being traded in, vehicle identification numbers, pictures of the car and such, and then immediately the funds for that trade in were electronically transmitted to the dealers account. Imagine how happy everyone would be then. It would be a smart program. It would assure dealers and buyers that a smart program can work, quickly and efficiently. Instead, people and dealers grew frustrated by the paperwork and the lack of direction. Guess what? These same people could see the parallels of the healthcare plan running right alongside the clunkers program. Did you really want some DC shlub looking at your healthcare profile and making decisions based on his/her whimsy? No, and even though I detect the healthcare industrial complex like you can not imagine, the only thing worse would be the cash for clunkers mentality transposed onto the new healthcare committee in charge of who gets what.

Losing Vegas

I often find myself reading Time Magazine online. If I am flying I actually may buy a copy of the magazine, but most of the time, almost daily really, I check its online version.

During the filming of Deregulating Greed I sat down with Justin Fox, a Time business reporter and blogger. He is in the film, kind of an anchor, kind of a Greek chorus. He shared all kinds of interesting perspectives on the economy, how the collapse happened and what we might expect in the future. Smart guy.

But the linked story at the top of this page is a Joel Stein piece on Las Vegas. It is a great piece and one I think a lot of people who have ever visited the city will enjoy, like and in the end shake their heads. Vegas did what most other American cities did in the past 10 years or so, borrow a boat load of cash and invest it in useless stuff. Individuals used home loans to buy big screen TV's and gas guzzling cars. Vegas developers bartered their way for billions to build lavish casinos without ever thinking that the real estate balloon may some day burst. When it did, it burst especially bad in Vegas.

In some ways, Vegas is everything great about America and everything that is wrong. It is great because it allows people to have fun, to live beyond their means for a weekend, to gamble and drink and partake in all sorts of behaviors probably frowned upon the towns and cities that the people who flock to Vegas usually call home. It is also a perfect example of what is wrong. The above mentioned living beyond your means is not a good long term lifestyle, as many many people are finding out. Also, if you look around any place in America you will see the bodies of people who have spent too much time in the proverbial all you can eat buffets.

While Vegas plays up its naughty image, "what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas," one of the great lines from this summers blockbuster comedy The Hangover was "except herpes". Vegas does that, brilliant at the PR that makes it sound glamorous and sexy, and yet, anyone who has ever spent a night walking from casino to casino gets bombarded with postcards for hookers and sad and pathetic drunks.

So read the Time article and think about your last trip to Vegas, and think about what happens when people exploit a weakness, addiction and greed, and in the end all houses made of cards share the same fate.

Seattle, always classy

I am not proud of my torrid affair years ago with Brad Pitt. It happened, get over it. Since we do share a history, he reads my blog, I watch his movies and sometimes, late at night, we talk about our children.

I moved from Seattle a few years ago, for a variety of reasons. While the exact move ended up being incredibly stupid, ripped off and living on a farm with sheep and chickens, actually moving from Seattle was brilliant. Don't get me wrong, Seattle is a lovely town, with swell people, lots of bikes, great restaurants and a lot of psychotic losers.

One of the things I will never miss, make that two things, are the whiney liberals who must reach consensus on everything. I swear, nothing will happen in that city until the pot smoking birkenstock wearers gather, debate, discuss, smoke a bong full and decide that more debate must take place. I always felt that what Seattle needed more than anything was a real leader, one elected person who would come in and just railroad some initiatives into place, damn the slow witted hippies and their endless talk.

The other thing, political correctness run amok. Someone once called this strange behavior "Seattle nice" and that may capture the concept, if by nice you mean boring. If you had a strong opinion in the wrong crown in Seattle, you would be sent outside with the smokers to mull over the concept of nice, all by yourself, in the rain and some organic tobacco abusers.

Every now and then, though, someone in Seattle does something that is both ballsy and wrong. One year, on labor day, some adventurous artists put a ball and chain on "Hammering Man" an adequate statue positioned outside of the Seattle Art Museum. Hammering Man came to epitomize the working man, standing tall outside a rather boring building, with his arm moving mechanically 24 hours a day. Well, mostly 24 hours a day. In my time in Seattle Hammering Man, like many a union worker, found injuries and fatigue a decent enough reason to fake an injury and take some time off.

But the picture above is Seattle in all its glory. First, it's very funny, and totally politically incorrect and, this being done in Seattle, was quickly removed, so as not to cause anyone to complain, debate, bitch and moan and call all their lesbian friends for a quick protest over coffee and pizza.

I often think about moving back to the Northwest, but I won't do it. Much like my affair with Brad Pitt, it has been done and I have moved on.

Cash for clunkers

When the first billion dollars was used up in this incredibly successful government program a couple of weeks ago, I blogged about this may have been the only program I had ever witnessed that worked on so many levels.

For the life of me, I do not know why the government was so quick to spend hundreds of billions of dollars to save shitty banks, and only 3 billion to encourage people to trade in crappy cars for efficient and better cars. It makes no sense. Talk about reversed priorities.

Imagine if all government economic programs had a real effect on real people. As it stands, over 500 billion dollars has been flushed down the black hole that is the American banking system, and not a note of new regulation has been passed. Instead, you get the insane republicans bitching about 3 billion that has helped car dealers, car makers, average people and the environment.

I am sure some slick talking alcoholic republican can spin this as some ineffective giveaway to the poor or underserving. These same empty suits would never bother to speak out about the reckless waste of taxpayers money spent on AIG or Bank of America. It is insane to think of how much money was quickly tossed at the stupid leaders of these corporations with no expectations and no conditions. But 3 billion to get junkers and polluters off the road for good? Possibly the most successful hands on government program I have ever witnessed.

The problem with elected officials of all stripes is that they soon bend over for big business and forget who actually casts the votes that put them in their leather seats. This is not a rant against elections or the people who win them, it is a complaint about how quickly politicians cave to big business and how little respect they have for real people.

In a smarter world, 500 billion would be spent to buy up all old clunkers, get thos polluting monsters off the road and give people the money to get them into smart, better, more economical transportation. Sure, that would be some form of socialism, but then, what is 500 billion to bankers, stock traders and money changers? The bottom line, which no one seems to ever really look at anymore, is what did we get for propping up the badly run banking system? I can not come up with any answer. But the 3 billion for clunkers, that one is easy.

Health care

I generally do not care about the healthcare debate. I care less about the whimpering between republicrats and their brothers in arms, the democlans. This healthcare debate, with the insane white people loudly protesting their right to look stupid in public, should end in a few weeks when congress returns from their vacation and hopefully the democratic majority grows some balls.

Ouch.

The truth is this, Americans knew what they were getting into when they voted in democratic majorities in both houses and the White House. What the Dems seem to have forgotten is that the people were right for a change, voting for change. The majority of Americans who have ever stubbed a toe knows that our healthcare system is so screwed up it may as well be run by Jon and Kate and the 8 saplings they somehow created.

Change we can believe in? I got that right here. Quit trying to work with the republicans, time and again where the democrats are concerned, they have proven to be the enemy. These republicans are not patriots, but instead, they are corporate shills with no morals, ethics and backbone, a lot like the typical democrat at this point. The difference? Democrats control the process. I say, forget about debating these weasels, just do single payer today, and let the chips fall where the will.

See, here is how memory works. I voted last November, buy already, I have no clue who I voted for or why I voted. What I wanted then is different that what I want now. In a year and a half when the elections roll around again, I will vote again for my special interests, which amount to beer and sex.

So, if you want to get this healthcare thing done, do the big move. Single payer, screw you republicans. Some people will be up in arms, most will not and in two years, when people go to the polls, people will either support your brilliance, or toss you out of office for bankrupting our country. But guess what? That fact will not be much different if you diddle around and do nothing much. People will hate you for having both houses and trying to appease the insane republicans. People will not respect you as leaders if you do not lead. People will vote you out of office if you basically did nothing. So, you could be screwed either way, but in the end, 10 years from now, people will be going to doctors and not worrying about whether that headache that has been bothering them is stress from work, or a tumor, because either way, it's covered.

So, if you are an elected member of either house, ask yourself this, do you want to go down in history as someone who wore cheap suits, had a fake tan and tried to negotiate with republican terrorists, or do you want to be a leader who made a touch, but smart, decision that will better this country over many decades? That is not such a tough choice, make it, vote and run to the nearest tanning salon.

Foreclosure crisis

Here is the opening paragraph from todays Washington Post:

The country's growing unemployment is overtaking subprime mortgages as the main driver of foreclosures, according to bankers and economists, threatening to send even higher the number of borrowers who will lose their homes and making the foreclosure crisis far more complicated to unwind.

Now, a few months ago I spoke with an editor at Fortune Magazine who, while declining to call this mess a depression, said that there will be more trouble ahead. She was referring to credit card troubles and she was right, but I think the big trouble is lower wages and higher mortgages. That is the foundation of much of our society and I am not talking economy here, I mean society.

There are a lot of pundits and economists who I think miss the big picture. Last year, while GW fiddled, the economy came very close to a complete meltdown. One can not keep using credit cards to finance bad lifestyle choices, and those could be unnecessary wars or big screen TV's. It all comes to an ugly end at some point, and last year it looked like the bill collector was about to knock on Americas front door.

I am still not sure President Obama and his bloated stimulus program will work, there remain a lot of that stimulus money unspent, but even if that works to shore up the economy, it will burden generations with more debt. Without massive reform and regulation, this country will continue to these cycles where everyone makes money and then no one does. No one, not even loud mouth Barney Frank is taking reform and regulation seriously. There was a lot of blathering about it months ago, but now you hear nothing.

This does not even take into account the idiot bankers who walked the economy to the edge. They are still in charge and many are still asking for millions in compensation and getting it. Let me get this right, AIG, Citigroup and Bank of America all were run my seemingly retarded monkeys, and now those same monkeys demand higher and higher salaries? This idiocy can not be regulated, but it does have to stop.

The college years

I have been his dad for a long time now, even though is really does seem like yesterday I was calling him boodle and carrying him on my hip. I am driving him to college in a couple of days and I am feeling all sorts of strange and mostly unwelcome emotions of late. This really does not seem like it could be happening. This is, by far, the longest relationship I have ever experienced and I know it will continue, just not in the same platform that is has been.

Finding art where you find it

I was just out walking today in downtown Pittsburgh, kind of scoping out the area because I have an assignment next month and I wanted to get an idea of how the city if laid out and good places to hide.

While walking the streets (your pun here) I stumbled across this poster, well this is actually part of a much larger poster, but still, this is a very beautiful part of it.

Shepard Fairey (sorry if I spell his name wrong) is the artist responsible for all those posters found in major cities around the work, with the giant OBEY below the image. He also did the iconic poster of Barack Obama and HOPE for the past election cycle. I like his work. I am not sure how art touches someone, what it means, or even if it supposed to mean something, but there is really something quite fascinating about his work.

As an artist who spent many years putting up posters and images around the world, I admire his ability to find a way to market his work in strange and compelling ways. I know a lot of artists who have a lot more talent than I, but over the course of about 6 years, I sold a heck of a lot of paintings, all because I was constantly finding new ways to market the work. I am not sure if that is part of Fairey's objective here, but if it is, it's pretty smart. If not, it still is pretty smart.

I'll post more of his work in the coming days, as I continue to be motivated to walk the downtown streets of Pittsburgh, prepping for coving the G-20 summit in late September.

Bike to wherever

The article linked above is all about what it would take to get Americans to bike to work. For about ten years now I have been biking a lot of places, although to be honest, since a little tiny accident in 2005 I spend less time on the road biking and more time in my studio biking, more later.

I'll answer the question though. 20 dollars. It will take 20 dollars to get Americans to bike to work. That and hovering bikes that fly on command.

First, 20 dollars is the magic figure for a gallon of gas where the world will change dramatically and forever. Until then, people will continue to justify everything. "Oh, I just have to drive to the corner grocery store, just in case they have a sale on toilet paper."

We are a super power in name only. The world is falling apart, the world economy is leading the way, and while the world dies, we eat. Americans are the fattest country in the history of the world. Now, think about that for just a second. We are fat, fat unlike any other culture in the history of the world. You may think, like I did, that there just had to be some fat culture somewhere in history, even if you are stupid enough to believe we have only inhabited this marble for 5000 years. Surely the Incas or someone loved the porcine. Right? Maybe, but not the the vast numbers we have managed to put together. Maybe the Incas lusted after one fatty and all the other people were jealous, after all, for many centuries it took a shitload of money to get fat.

Now it takes the dollar menu at Burger King.

Fat is everywhere. You can not throw your empty 40 ounce bottle of Coke classic without hitting an obese human. How did this happen? I would like to blame television, well, Fox News is probably partially responsible, mostly because the people who watch Fox News have lost touch with reality, so eating ten pizzas in one sitting seems like normal behavior after a while.

What really brought about this fat epidemic? There is a lot of conjecture, and I am more than willing to conject. First off, parents are fat. I see many many fat parents, waddling around playgrounds and sitting poolside, slurping iced mochas and the like. The tons of blubbery humans at a recent picnic area I found myself in was disgusting on a variety of levels.

I come from a fat family. My dad loved his beer, possibly more than his children, but why complain? He had the classic beer gut, and he seemed almost proud of it. Men can not get pregnant, but I think many like the look. Mens egos are often so off kilter, they actually think that having some huge gut adds to their attraction. I am sure, just judging by the number of huge couples I see, that someone is finding the whales attractive, maybe its their lovely personalities, who knows.

Strange thing, most of my friends are not fat. In fact, now that I think about it, none are. Here is another interesting fact, almost all ride bikes, some more competitively than others. Ten years ago, when I was going through a rather fun and sexy divorce, I started riding, for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is my understanding of the complexities of the dating world. So I rode and rode hard. I rode almost every day. Sometimes I would ride over 100 miles a day. After a few years of this, I was buff and in great shape. Sure, I crashed a couple of times, but nothing too serious and I would never miss more than a few days with injuries.

Biking changed my life. It is one of those touchstones that one finds when they look back on their life. You can see the marriages and the birth of children, jobs lost and found, affairs found and lost, books read and forgotten and through it all, we find the places in our past that actually meant something. Bike has meant something to me, almost every time I have been on a cycle. Imagine that, what else can one say that means something every time you do it? I would like to say making love to a lover, but to be honest, that has not always been the case.

No, biking was that self powered form of transportation that not only got me from point A to point B, but also made me happy and healthy. The same could never be said for a car, no matter how far the top goes down or the speed you can attain. I have been addicted to a few things in my life and nothing compares to the high you get from a long ride. Nothing.

So, again, when will Americans leave their cars and begin riding bikes to work, to shop, to live? 20 dollars a gallon may force it. I would like to think that given the chance many people would remember the freedom a bike gave them as a child. Often a bike is our first real taste of parentless independence. Maybe that would get some of these hefty people to leave behind the comfort of air conditioning and ride for a few hours.

See, I was once one of the fatties, fast on my way to diabetes, heart disease and insulating myself with an extra 30 pounds or so. I am not a psychiatrist nor to I prescribe to much of their pablum, but this much I think I understand, if you ask a fat person why they have gained so much weight, you will often hear a story of love gone wrong, betrayal on a variety of levels or just plain self hatred.

A good long bike ride would be the start of turning all that around.

Cashing in on clunkers

I remember the dream my parents used to experience when they would entertain the idea of a new car purchase. “Car salesmen are not to be trusted,” my mother would declare.

A few years ago I purchased a Scion xB, a boxy little car that I grew fond of. Last year I had to sell the car to raise money to finish the full length documentary on the faltering economy. As things have improved financially I thought it was a good time to find a replacement, plus, as written about here, I found the government Cash for Clunkers program to be one of the best deals of my lifetime.

Last month I visited a local Nissan dealership because I had seen pictures of the new Cube and thought it fit the same sort of design code as the Scion. I test drove one and really enjoyed the experience. At that time I was in the mode of moving and working and did not have the time, energy or cash to start the process. I left some information with the dealer, and told them I would return.

I stayed in touch with the dealer over the past few weeks. Financing was secured, I would be able to trade in my old Jeep for a 4500 voucher from the government and everything was in place. Whenever I spoke to the dealer I would make clear that I was interested in the LS model of the Cube, which is not the top end model, but it had features I really liked, such as a keyless ignition system.

This past weekend I called again to make sure everything was on track. At that time I was told it had been more than 30 days since the financing package was secured and they would have to re-submit everything, but I was assured there would be no issue. I asked about colors of the LS model they had in stock, and again, I was assured any color I wanted would be available as long as I stopped in and left a deposit. Again, no problem.

While I was out that day I stopped in at another Nissan dealership and looked at a Cube. A very nice, professional salesman engaged me in conversation and when I told him how I already had everything in place with another dealer, he said he could beat any deal they had made. We sat in an LS, he showed me all the great features and while the price break would not be significant, 100 dollars, this dealership seemed intent on good service.

So I filled out all the paperwork, again, and left a deposit. Now I was in the position to play dealer against dealer. Yesterday I called dealer one, again told they had a LS on the lot and if I stopped in and picked out a color, left a deposit, everything would be in place for a Friday purchase. I thought I should go in, since this was the first dealer I had worked with and they seemed intent on winning my business. I made sure, on the phone, that we were talking about the LS with the keyless ignition. I was assured.

We drove to the dealer. When we arrived a classic sleazy salesman dragged us onto the lot where he showed a completely stripped down model, nothing special about the car at all. Then he showed a couple of others, ending finally with the LS. I looked on the price and it was about 2500 more than I had been financed for and I asked what that meant. In classic scummy salesman technique, he said we could go talk to the finance guy and see if we could swing it.

My mind was whirling, but I knew, after many conversations with the finance guy, that all along we had talked about the LS, and that this must just be a misunderstanding. Financing guy said that I had been approved for enough money and that with the Cash for Clunkers money in place, I could indeed afford the more expensive car. I argued that all along we had been talking about the same car, but for less money, and that the payment was affordable, until they added the extra 2500 dollars.

At that point I was steamed. I saw the game being played for exactly what it was. Classic bait and switch. In fact, in the office of sleazy salesman, I told him as much and he assured me that this was in no way bait and switch. I was livid and explained that for weeks we had been talking about an LS, the financing was written for an LS, the phone calls had all centered around an LS. When I got to the lot, we were no longer talking about the LS. Bait, meet switch.

I walked out to my car, angry and betrayed. I called the other dealership, the one that I had left a deposit on a car a week earlier. The one where the nice salesman had sat in the car with me, showed me keyless ignition, and promised the beat the other dealers price. I told them I was being bait and switched. I spoke with the finance guy, then the same salesman we had liked so much. He assured me that the LS I had left a deposit on was still available, same price, everything was fine.

I went back to sleazy salesman office and told him how disgusting his game was. I got in the car and started to drive home and called the “good” dealership one more time to lock in the LS and end these games. When I spoke with the salesman again, all I wanted to hear was “keyless ignition” because that was the feature that had lured me to the LS in the first place. He assured me that this was the car we were talking about and he put me on hold to check to make sure one would be available.

When he got back on the phone, he said, “I made a mistake, the car we were talking about does not have the keyless ignition.” I believe steam began to come out of my ears. Same bait, same switch. Same scummy car sales practices. Before I could even begin to discuss this sad state of sales gamesmanship, I hung up the phone in disgust.

Nissan? You seem to have some nice cars. My only question is, really? Is this the sort of scam you want to promote? Are the sad techniques really the sort of games you want to play, in 2009? My father, his ashes rolling around in the San Francisco bay somewhere, must be smiling and nodding and thinking, “thank the good lord sweet jesus I never have to walk through those doors again.”

Lying liars

Everyone tells lies, somewhere, sometime. It’s part of who we are, unable to be honest about the taste of a particularly bad dish, unable to admit a relationship is over, unable to keep our hands off others money. Lies lies lies.

In a recent interview with an attorney, Bernie Madoff sounded surprised that he “got away” with his Ponzi Scam for so long. Anyone who has ever been scammed or screwed over or just flat out lied to knows the opposite story, how could I ever have fallen for that loser, lier, whatever.

So today, as part of my job, I was sitting in as attorneys chatted with an expert witness. As I sat through the first house, I was kind of bored, but also a bit provoked. See, this witness was an expert in health care, a provider of healthy living and yet, he was a piggy. So, for the longest time, I kept thinking, who in their right mind is going to get treatment from someone who does not follow their own regimen.

Then the expert began to slip. Sure, he said, he was the president of a health institute. And when asked later, by the opposing attorney, how many members belonged to this institute, the answer was, “me and my business partner.”

Heck, I could form an institute of blogging boneheads, elect myself president and probably become a TV talking head, spouting nonsense like most of the others. (I should make a note to myself to do just that).

The lawyers continued to seek information from the president of the institute of silliness. As he spoke more and more questionable information sprang from his silly mouth and I began to have flashback to all the people in my life who I had caught lying to me. There is a pattern to these truth stretchers. As long as you will believe them, they will continue with the lies. It is only after they have been questioned, when things no longer add up, do they either retreat into the darkness, or in a couple of cases, lash out in wildly dramatic screaming fits. The more you question their integrity, the more they go from passionate self defense to nutty idiocy and finally making threats of lawsuits or some such.

So, it was with deep satisfaction that I watched an attorney take the president of made up institute to task. It was fun watching the fakery stripped to the bone, watching a man who had obviously not had anyone question his credentials have someone intelligently question his credentials.

And like Bernie Madoff and so many others, the president walked out of the room, maybe not changed, but certainly chagrined.

I walked out smiling.

wingnuts on parade

The right wing continues to push the buttons on the tiny brains of the most anxious and undereducated. Why is it always badly dressed white people who show up to scream about things they know nothing about? Ever see an anti-abortion rally? It is almost always white men in polyester. Now, these same zombies are out and about complaining about healthcare.

First, if your passion is so strong and your message is so important, why not debate like adults? Screaming never wins the argument, whether in a business environment or a debate.

This reminds me of this woman I once worked with. She was the in charge of some non-sense aspect of the company, human resources of some sort, but when there was a meeting she would show up and at some point she would lose it. She had no real important function, but when given the chance to stand up and exclaim how important she thought she was, people would become bored and once she realized she was the joke, she would start screaming about something or another. It was almost always funny.

In the end, no one took her seriously. She was just another sad, obese, angry loser. I expect to see her at a healthcare “debate” any day now.

Deregulating greed

I am trying this other format, and by other, I mean I have been blogging my ass off for over a year on the website set up to host short films gathered from the longer form film I have been shooting and editing called Deregulating Greed. You can see that site and read all about that and the adventures in discussing the faltering economy, although just today, the dreaded New York Times announced the good news that the economy is recovering, while in the same story, they announced the economy is dying.

Both sides of a story? Go figure.

Anyway, the corrupt pigs who run Google somehow offered me space to move my blog to, mostly because they must have found a way to "monetize" the process, because that is what they do at Google. If my "adwords" experience will be educational, once Google makes money off this blog, they will shut it down before they have to pay me.

Anyway, check out www.deregulatinggreed.com and look over some of the short films that were posted while that film was in production. The longer form film is being submitted to film festivals right now, and is, of course, available for purchase right there on the site. I also have a cool gig with a major conservative news organization to cover the G-20 summit in September, when the world economic powers will grace the beautiful city of Pittsburgh with their expertise and sexy life partners. I will be posting gobs of video from those meetings either on the dereg site, or somehow on here.

As it stands, this remains a test. More readers here, I would probably move the other blog here, although I have some people following there who may or may not bother to move on over. It's a test.