Landmark Theaters Employee Union

I am wondering what you think of this latest article from the Nation:

"I will tell you that there won't be any corporate considerations. No earnings per share issues, No worries about advertisers and what they might think." Okay, you probably think these are lines from a recent Nation editorial or Bill Moyers' latest speech.

It's actually Mark Cuban blogging about his negotiations with Dan Rather to launch a program on HDNet,, his high-definition cable channel that reaches about 3 million homes. (Later this week, Rather will announce that he's joining Cuban's channel--launching "Dan Rather Presents" this October. ) Cuban also owns HDfilms production company.

At a time when CBS News is run by "by bean counters and profiteers with no interest in serious news," as Moyers recently put it, the billionaire entrepreneur and owner of the Dallas Mavericks basketball franchise seems ready to revive public interest journalism.

Katrina Vanden Heuvel, "A Maverick Media Mogul Takes on Mainstream Spinelessness," The Nation Blog 7/11/06

Moshi, Tanzania-On my first day here in Tanzania, I wrote, “We woke-up today at about 6:30 am to the sounds of roosters, chickens and dogs. Look outside and all you can see are hills, trees, and vegetation. It is very beautiful.” Such false impressions of this country are easy with minimal exposure to it. What I neglected to mention, as a result of ignorance, was the waxing effects of a drought on the people and land here, which is the result of poverty and global warming, something I will revisit later. But my wrong fancy about the country in my initial naïve awe has been replaced with a basic and crude understanding of northern Tanzanian.

Through increased observation, experience, and dialog with the people of Tanzania, I have come to learn simple insights into some of the difficulties communities here encounter in obtaining basic human needs. The first thing I learned of import is this: regardless of a Tanzanian farmer’s choice of crop, be it coffee, corn or bananas, the country-wide drought here this season is expected to have profound effects on overall yields. One can only speculate on how such depletion in yields will bear on the food supply here, as most of the food consumed in Tanzania is grown locally. Such staples as corn and rice could be in short supply in the coming year, and coupled with the already on-going food crisis here in East Africa, any exasperation of this calamity could result in difficult rationing and increased cases of malnutrition. Already the Tanzanian government “has directed immediate importation of 42,000 tonnes of relief food” and are asking the international community, “individual Tanzanians, charity, and religious organizations…to come forward and help the needy.”

Beyond agriculture and food supply, the drought is affecting every other sector of life here. Power has had to be rationed due to low water levels in the Mtera Hydroelectric Dam in Iringa, which is in the central part of the country. Last Friday, when I was in Monduli, power was shut-off between 6:00am and 11:00pm. Similarly power has been cut for blocks of time during the weekend, but done in such a way as to not disturb the religious ceremonies of the country’s many churches and mosques. Such cuts in supplies of electricity have severely limited the capacity of businesses here. I passed by an office supply store that could only sell paper and make change for smaller bills during the power outage. At the District Council later that afternoon, I witnessed official documents typed-out using old, non-electric typewriters. As I walked past one office after another, listening to the clanking sound of these machines echoing-off the hot sidewalk, I was taken-aback in realization as to how easy it remains to digress in technological capabilities anywhere due to changes in the environment. How much the “developed” world takes for granted the technological infrastructure it depends on today became strikingly clearer for me at this time. I think then I felt we in the North are as equally venerable, but will take first from others as our desperation becomes more acute. e.g., the war and occupation against Iraq.

Yesterday I traveled with Mr. Gabriel Lyatuu, manager of the “organic project,” at the Kilimanjaro Native Cooperative Union (KNCU), up the slopes of Mt. Kilimanjaro to an area known as Marangu. While we ascended the dusty, sun-beat dirt roads from what I am told is a usually lush mountainside, and crept further and further into ill forests, I saw for great distances huge fields of dying sunflowers. Here sunflowers seeds are processed for oil and fed to cattle, but most impressing on me was the amount of fatigue these plants showed, they certainly are in their last measure of life.

I will report more on what I have found at the Primary Society when I have time, my laptop is running out of battery and power is shut-off in Moshi today due to the drought, but the most striking thing I learned yesterday was that coffee yields for the KNCU are down 50 percent due to the drought! This seems like a high number, and something I will defiantly need to verify, but the basic point is that with decreased yields farmers will suffer a loss of income, cooperatives will suffer a loss of revenue, the quality of the coffee will deteriorate (both organic and fair trade markets, and higher-paying specialty coffee buyers in general demand superior quality coffee), and many will suffer. What is more, most of these farmers here are also subsistence farmers. Meaning, their food supply will also be impacted by the drought.

Haven't seen it yet?  Want to watch it again and again? Here are a couple links to O'Reilly's appearance on Letterman:

http://www.cbs.com/latenight/lateshow/dave_tv/ls_dtv_big_show_highlights.shtml

http://onegoodmove.org/1gm/1gmarchive/002750.html#002750

Go see something at The Brattle!

If you were not already aware, The Brattle needs to raise $400,000 by year's end or they will be forced to cease film programming at the Brattle Theatre.

See their films, buy many bags of popcorn, give them your money!!!

Sure, this has nothing to do with the Kendall or the union, but it does have everything to do with independent film. 

http://www.brattlefilm.org/brattlefilm/