3 Questions

The Professional Loser

Filed under: 3 Questions

You could say that Shawn Faust is a professional loser. As a player and coach of the Washington Generals, the Harlem Globetrotters' opponents, he hasn't known the thrill of victory a single time in his five years on the squad.

You could say that Shawn Faust is a professional loser. As a player and coach of the Washington Generals, the Harlem Globetrotters' opponents, he hasn't known the thrill of victory a single time in his five years on the squad. In fact, the last time the Generals upset the Globetrotters was in 1971, before Faust was even born. He and the rest of the team will try three times at their stop at the Target Center to disrupt the Globetrotters' record of more than 22,500 wins (and 345 losses) in over 80 years.

City Pages:How many games to do the Generals play against the Globetrotters each year?
Shawn Faust:Usually we do a four-month U.S. tour and it's around 120 games. Then we go overseas and do another 50 or 60 in Europe, then we go to South America. We go all over the world, so it's well over 200 games a year, easy.

CP:How did you end up playing for the Generals?
SF:I got invited to a pro-combine in Orlando, FL when I got out of college, so I went down for the weekend and played. There were a bunch of different players and scouts and agents everywhere looking at players. So then it's just a matter of playing well, doing the right thing on the right day at the right time in front of the right person. I've been here for five years.

The Generals' logo says it all.

CP:How does playing against the Globetrotters compare to playing college basketball or other pro basketball?
SF:Well, it's a professional setting, so it's going to be way different from college. It's a professional game so it's faster, it's stronger. I like it a lot more than the college setting.

CP:As a player/coach, how do you prepare to play the same team day in and day out? Do you review game tape and study your opponent like other pro basketball teams?
SF:I'm kind of the leader and mentor of the other guys out here. The thing of it is, you have to reassure them that yeah, it's tough to win. We go out, we play hard, we really go after it. But they have to understand that once you do get that one win, everything will shut down, it will be ridiculous to be part of something like beating the Globetrotters. So that always keeps the flame going. We talk, we work on our own games, and practice if we get time to do it. A lot of the time we just get to the city and show up and play. It's a fun gig though; I will say that.

CP:The Globetrotters' claim that the games are real and competitive, but they've only lost 345 games in 81 years. Can you understand why fans are skeptical when they're told that the games are competitive?
SF:I mean, you know, the last time we won in 1971. The Globetrotters have their entertainment stuff and they do their tricks and that's what they do. But they are good basketball players too. We do go at it. We do play, we're out to make shots and try to beat them. I've been around five years and never missed a shot on purpose or anything like that. So we do play, they just have good, talented players. We just have to bring it. Hopefully one of these times we'll just bring it and maybe get that win.

CP:Does losing ever get old?
SF:I'm a competitive guy, and nobody likes to lose. I think that all the losses that I've taken over my five years, and the losses the newer guys are getting right now will definitely go away if we do get that one win. Hopefully it's coming soon. Really though, it's all about the experience. We get to travel everywhere. We're going all over the United States, all over the world. I've been to all 50 states and I've been to over 60 countries. So, I mean, that's another priceless experience that comes with it. So I think that all that good outweighs all the losses.

CP:Are you hopeful that your current lineup will ever beat the Globetrotters?
SF:Yeah, I mean last night's game we only lost by six. We've lost by three before on this tour. We've lost by one before, two or three years before. So, it is doable. It really is.

CP:But you'd figure even a good team like the Globetrotters would lose more often than 345 times in 81 years. Why is it so hard for the Generals to beat them?
SF:That's a good question. In all my years, we've come close; we gone after it, but we just keep coming up short for some reason. You know, I'm a basketball guy too, and it's as real as it gets. We just go out and play hard every night. Tonight might be that night. You never know.

CP:Are the Generals' players well compensated for playing and losing?
SF:Yeah, it's decent. But it's more about the experience of going all over the world playing against probably the most known team in the world. So, it's more about being part of something really cool and really special and trying to be part of something even more special: beating them.

Tonight might be the night! But probably not. See Shawn and his scrappy band of ballers go down in flames today at 1 and 7 p.m. at Target Center.

Posted by Ben Palosaari at April 11, 2008 10:30 AM | Comments (0)

 

Former "Plumber" aims to plug ethical leaks

Filed under: 3 Questions

In 2001, former Nixon 'Plumber' Egil 'Bud' Krogh sent a memo the President Bush's staff warning them about upholding the law, even when pressured not to. They didn't listen. He's hoping others will.

Egil “Bud” Krogh knows the risks of blindly following orders. As one of Richard Nixon's “Plumbers,” Krogh's job was to prevent high-level government leaks, which often had him doing unethical things. He was indicted for his actions and spent four and a half months in jail after pleading guilty to depriving a person of civil rights. In 2001, he sent a memo the President Bush's staff warning them about upholding the law, even when pressured not to. They didn't listen. He's hoping others will. Recently he wrote Integrity: Good People, Bad Choices, and Life Lessons from the White House, and he'll participate in the discussion “Watergate Revisited: The Ethics of the Lawyers” at the University of St. Thomas.

City Pages: During your time in the White House, you acted unethically, but claimed at the time that you were justified in what you did. Now, however, you openly admit you were wrong. Tell me about your epiphany.
Egil Krogh: I was involved in the Nixon staff as the co-director of the unit tasked with investigating Daniel Ellsberg who had released the top secret Pentagon Papers to The New York Times. And the president described this as a national security crisis and assigned me and David Young to the job of finding out everything we could about why those documents were released, and what could be done to keep him from becoming this an anti-war hero. For almost two years, I participated in a covert operation that was undertaken in 1971 into the office of Dr. Lewis Fielding, Ellsberg's psychiatrist, as a national security imperative; something we had to do because of how the president described the nature of the threat. I believed that for two years. It was two years after this covert operation--or burglary--had occurred, that I had an epiphany. I was with my family for Thanksgiving, and I was under indictment yet free to travel, free to associate with whom I wanted, to say whatever I wanted to a reporter, to go to the church of my choice. The question became, how can I enjoy all of these rights and then defend that conduct that stripped away the 4th Amendment right of another American citizen without being a hypocrite? Approving that break-in; that operation struck at the heart of what this government was established to protect against. I concluded that my defense was something I couldn't live with any longer, and I needed to plead guilty to depriving Dr. Fielding of his right to be free from an unreasonable, unwarranted search.

CP: Why do you think that while you openly admit that what you did was wrong, others from the administration, the president himself and G. Gordon Liddy, for example, never did that?
EK:I don't know that answer to that. I think the others had more experience in the world of counterespionage and national security. I know Liddy had worked for the FBI for years, E. Howard Hunt had worked for the CIA, and I think they felt that under circumstances that the president defines as a national security crisis, that they could do certain things outside the law, and it would be justifiable. It gets down to what you think a president is authorized to do under crisis conditions, and I didn't feel that the president or those working on his behalf could set aside the law with impunity as they saw fit. I know others didn't agree with me. And I'm not telling you I'm right. I'm just telling you what I felt was right for me under those circumstances. I felt a huge sense of relief when I was finally able to plead guilty.

CP:How would you describe the ethics of the Bush White House?
EK:I think the ethics in the Bush White House have left something to be desired, particularly in how they have evaluated the proper response to the terrorist attacks of September 11. I think that they have taken positions, particularly in how they defined torture and the authority of the commander-in-chief in a particular legal memorandum that is so far afield of what torture means and what authority the commander-in-chief can exercise. They defined it to give them the ability to carryout very difficult and I think very cruel interrogations at Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib. And the conduct that occurred in Abu Ghraib obviously was criminal conduct on the part of those who were engaged in it, and some of them have gone to prison for it. But I think the unethical part of it is the legal memoranda farther up the chain (of command) that define torture as so extreme that it sent the message that you could carryout very cruel and inhumane interrogations with impunity. And that to me was wrong, and I identify that in my book. I also think they went afield when deciding that they could authorize through the National Security Agency the wiretapping of U.S. citizens talking with suspected members of terrorist organizations abroad without getting statutory authority. I think they've gotten it recently, but their initial response was to do it themselves. I'm a deep believer in giving each body, the legislative, executive and judicial, its role to play in matters of national emergency and crisis. I think we should have gotten the authority of congress first before undertaking that kind of eavesdropping program.

CP:You write in your book that pleading guilty to your crimes was key in restoring a certain level of your integrity. What's the best way to prevent current young bureaucrats from making the same mistakes you made?
EK:One of the reasons I wrote the book was to offer some guidance for how to stay safe in these situations where there is enormous pressure to get results. I wrote the book that I wished I could have read almost 39 years ago when I was sworn into my position. What I tried to do is point out that when you get these positions, you're basically sworn to uphold the constitution, that's your primary responsibility. You have to have loyalty to the people in the organization for which you work, but you have to temper that with your loyalty to what our founding document requires of you. And I just didn't do that. I was willing to do what I thought Richard Nixon wanted me to do and that trumped everything else. And what I try to point out in the book is that you have to have balanced loyalties. You're not going to get a job in a political organization without being loyal to a candidate and to the values he espouses. But you also have to realize that he too is subject to constitutional limitations, and you have to be able and willing to adhere to those even though you might displease you superiors. So I try to describe through the 'integrity zone' concept at the end of my book, what are the questions that can keep young bureaucrats safe. I pose those questions that I didn't ask in 1971, and they're simplistic questions, but you have to apply them to wherever you are, no matter what job it might be. For me, I had to plead guilty, and it's wasn't an altogether pleasant experience to plead guilty and be disbarred, but I was finally able to see where the thinking went wrong, and it really came back to my personal integrity, and not to let you it slip through your fingers. Maintain it at all costs.

CP:Do you ever worry that you'll never be free from the Nixon stigma?
EK:Sure, but I feel that, at least since I've come back to the practice of law and have been teaching and training, there's been a recognition from many people that I've done the best I could without trying to justify or excuse anything. Which is what I think you’ve got to do when you make a mistake like that. We're all going to make mistakes, maybe not as large as that one, but it's really what do you do afterwards and how to you try to rectify it that I think is really the issue. Richard Nixon never did, he was never able to face the fact that he had committed a crime. We would have been a lot better off if he had pleaded guilty to it and demonstrated the point that no man is above the law, including the president. Today, I feel that it is incumbent on me, because I had learned these lessons, to come forward and offer them to people who grapple with these issues every day.

CP:You've apologized to Daniel Ellsberg and Lewis Fielding, tell me about that. Did they forgive you?
EK:Right after I got out of prison, I felt I had to apologize to Lewis Fielding because when we carried out that covert operation in 1971 we didn't even see him as a potential victim of government misconduct. So while I can plead guilty and go to prison, that doesn’t complete what I have to do to show how wrong I thought that conduct was. He welcomed me to his office, and we talked for about 20 minutes. He did not exactly forgive me. He said, “I understand why you're here, and I appreciate your coming.” Later, I was on a platform at Dominica College just north of San Francisco, and Dan Ellsberg was there too. I told Dan how deeply I regretted it. He told me he thought he understood it. Now, since that time, Dan and I have become pretty good friends, he's written the foreword to my book, which is really quite extraordinary when you think about it, having the leaker and the plumber together between the covers of my book.

Hear Krogh discuss ethics along with two Watergate prosecutors and Nixon lawyer John Dean today at 4 p.m. at the University of St. Thomas School of Law building in downtown Minneapolis. Tickets are $25, call 651.962.4888 for more information.

Posted by Ben Palosaari at April 1, 2008 12:59 PM | Comments (0)

 

Bechdel Exam

Filed under: 3 Questions

Cartoonist Alison Bechdel discusses local businesses, coming up with ideas, and drawing memoirs.

CP: In the PR I received for your upcoming talk, a friend of yours states that it's always funny when somebody at a party says something then it shows up in one of your strips. How much of Dykes to Watch Out For comes from your daily life?

AB: You know, it's hard to say. In some ways, it totally doesn't come from my daily life. It's not at all autobiographical; I don't know these people, I make it all up. But the details of their lives, the texture of their lives, are just like my life. Their furniture, their computers, the co-op where they shop, the things they're reading; that is stuff is all in a way autobiographical. I feel like I'm sort of writing fiction and nonfiction at the same time. It's very much about the real world as I know it and the progressive leftist culture that I live in. Yet it's also completely made up out of my head.

CP: The bookstore in your strip, Madwimmin Books, is based on the Amazon Book Co-op in Minneapolis, which is now for sale. In your strip, a popular national chain buys out Madwimmin. Do you see a similar fate for Amazon?

AB: Well, I mean, I did close down the bookstore in my comic strip because that was what was happening to dozens of these stores all over the country. Although it was a sad thing to do, I felt like I needed to reflect the reality of what was going on. Amazon is one of the last holdouts. It's tough. I hope they'll make it.

CP: What do you think locally owned feminist bookstores offer that other bookstores don't?

AB: Oh god, soul, service, heart, and literacy! I mean, the whole culture is going to hell in a hand basket and the bookstores are just like an index of it. It's happening everywhere. There are fewer and fewer independent stores of any kind.

CP: Your graphic memoir, Fun Home, is very candid about your childhood, including your father's apparent suicide by stepping in front of a truck. Writing a memoir always involves confronting memories, but did you find it more difficult since you had to not only write about sad memories, but also draw them out?

AB: There were difficult moments certainly. I was doing crazy things; I went to the very spot where my dad was hit on the highway. I thought I was just going there to take reference shots to see what it looked like, but it was a very emotionally intense experience. Also, I posed as all the characters to do reference shots because I'm just not that good of a drawer. At one point I was impersonating my dead father in the casket, and I put on a jacket and tie and crossed my hands over my chest just to get it exactly right. That's insane, you know? Like, oh, my god, I'm my dead father. There were two levels going on. One was this very workaday, practical level. There was a lot of physical labor just of drawing and sketching and doing all the production of the book, which was kind of distracting from the emotional intensity of it. The emotional intensity of it was there, but it was like two parallel tracks.

CP: Your books are very well received, especially Fun Home, which Time named best book of the year in 2006. Do you plan on writing novels or other books without drawings?

AB:No, I don't. I just don't think I could do that. My whole writing process is very bound up with images. I can hardly think without visuals, that's kind of how I get from one point to another. Occasionally, I do have to write prose, but it's so arduous and difficult for me. I would just rather draw.

CP: So, when you're constructing the strip, do you start with the drawing or with the words?

AB: I start with the dialogue, but when I write, I'm using Adobe Illustrator. So even though I'm typing words, I'm thinking visually. I have my panels mapped out like a storyboard, and in my head I'm visualizing who the people are, where they are, and all that stuff. But I have to get it written before I start sketching.

CP: The town Marshall, Missouri came very close to banning Fun Home in 2006. At the time you said that you considered it an honor to be considered for banning. Tell me a little bit about that.

AB: Well, only because so many great books have been banned. I think it's an indicator that a text has an impact if people are going to the trouble to keep other people away from it. That's kind of flattering in a way. But of course it was disturbing and terrible, and people shouldn't censor the book. They didn't which was great.

CP: Have you encountered other places trying to ban your books?

AB: No, because I think mostly my Dykes to Watch Out For books aren't in small town public libraries. It hasn't really been an issue. I mean, I know they certainly are in some. They're in libraries here in Vermont, for example. But Fun Home just got more recognition and people saw it in a way that they didn't see Dykes.

CP: DTWOF seems to alternate politics, humor, and drama in every panel. Do you see it as one more than other? Is it more of a political cartoon or more of a soap opera, or an amusing comic?

AB:I feel like it is kind of like Doonsbury, only the opposite. Doonsbury is a political cartoon that uses a soap opera format. In my strip the emphasis is more on the soap opera side; the characters' intimate domestic lives. But it's still important to me to have current events and politics woven in, but it's a different balance than in Doonsbury.

CP: You've been writing the same characters now for many years. But your strip is not like *BR Garfield or some other comic that can just recycle the same punch lines over and over again. How do you keep coming up with storylines and jokes for them?

AB: Oh, my god, it's an endlessly escalating challenge! Every week the bar is higher because I can't repeat anything I've already done. It's an interesting form in that way, a long running serial work, it has to keep changing but it can't change too much because then it loses its audience. So, I'm always walking this tightrope between trying to keep it fresh and trying to do what I always do.

CP: How much longer do you think you'll be able to keep going then?

AB: I don't know. You know people like Bill Watterson (Calvin and Hobbes) and Gary Larson (Far Side) burnt out. But that was because--in Watterson's case--his strip didn't unfold in real time. Calvin was always 6 years old, and of course you couldn't keep that up forever unless it got really crappy. With Gary Larson, the format that he worked in was incredibly constraining. How long can you possibly keep coming up with brilliant one-line gag strips? Dan Piraro, author of Bizarro does it, I don't know how, but he does it. I feel like I have so many sources to draw on that I'm able to fuel it better. Current events are always changing, the characters live in real time so they're always aging and going through these life passages, and there is always something new to grapple with.

See Alison Bechdel speak tonight at the Humphrey Institute. Call 612.625.9436 for more information. Free. 7 p.m. 301 19th Ave. S., Minneapolis; 612.625.9436.

Posted by Ben Palosaari at March 6, 2008 3:42 PM | Comments (0)

 

Daniel Ellsberg: Beyond the Pentagon Papers

Filed under: 3 Questions

Daniel Ellsberg gave the White House and world quite a shock in 1971 when he leaked 7,000 classified pages of a Defense Department report outlining the full extent of the U.S. role in Vietnam to The New York Times. The documents revealed that the federal government had been steeped much deeper in battle in Vietnam than the public had been told, and that presidents had acted unconstitutionally to carry out their plans. Ellsberg was charged with espionage, theft, and conspiracy, and the federal government sued to stop newspapers from publishing the leaked documents. Ultimately, the charges were dropped, and the government lost its case in the Supreme Court. Since then, Ellsberg's political activism has gotten him arrested 70 times, as well as earning him several awards.

Tuesday he visits Northrop Auditorium to discuss dissent with U of M professor Larry Jacobs.

City Pages: Does everybody with information that American citizens should have about potential wars or governmental misdeeds have a responsibility to go public, even if it's a great risk to them?

Daniel Ellsberg: Not at all. There are secrets that should be kept certainly. I'll give you an example: the name “Valerie Plame Wilson,” the clandestine CIA operative the White House revealed wrongly in order to undercut Joe Wilson who was a truth teller with respect to Iraq. I would never have put that name out there and I don't know any colleagues that would have been so stupid to undermine an operation that was, after all, aimed at discovering periferation and stopping it. So, should anybody who has secrets put them out? No. That's a secret that should not have been put out and was put out by this administration for political purposes and it's not the only example.

The premise here is that in the case of a war like Iraq, as in Vietnam, there are hundreds and perhaps thousands of people who are well aware that the documents in their own office safes that would disprove statements the president is making in order to manipulate Congress into an illegal, hopeless, doomed war in which many people will be condemned to death both Americans and others—millions of Vietnamese and perhaps more than a million Iraqis by now. So that means that those people are aware, whether they think of it or not, their boss, that their president is violating the constitution of the United States which puts the decisions of war and peace into the hands of Congress.

By manipulating them falsely into an aggressive war, he's violated his oath of office to uphold the constitution, and when they keep silent about their knowledge of that situation, they are themselves violating their own oath to support and defend the Constitution. Other examples would include not only the Constitution, but domestic law. For example, probably hundreds, perhaps a thousand or more employees of the National Security Agency have been aware that the president was illegally and unconstitutionally violating the FISA in enlisting them to do warrantless wire tap surveillance of people in violation of that law and in violation of the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution. Those who kept silent about that, which are probably numbered in thousands all together, were violating their own oaths. Just as if the Senate proceeds to vote immunity for the telephone companies who were violating not an oath to the Constitution, but violating domestic law, as a number of them do. Giving them immunity from civil suits for those violations, as the Senate may or may not do in the next few days, would involve violating the oath of the office for each member who votes for that.

I say this in recognition--belated recognition--that I myself violated my oath when I was in the Pentagon in 1964 and 65 when I saw similar crimes being conducted without revealing them to Congress of the public. I didn't think of it in those terms, and I'm sure these people aren't thinking of it in these terms. But almost fifty years later, we've had enough experience for people to have gotten that message. I'm doing my best to really put out the message to people in that position: Don't do what I did. Don't wait till bombs are falling in Iran or a new war is started wrongly or thousands more people have died when you know that your bosses are lying the public into a wrongful war or committing other crimes or violating the constitution. I am urging them to do what I wish I had done in 1964, and that is to go before Congress and to the press to reveal truths that would save untold number of lives.

CP: The Republicans don't control either chamber of Congress, and President Bush only has a year left in office. Do you seriously think there is a good chance he will lead us to war in Iran in the next year?

DE: Yes, I do. I know some people think that new National Intelligence Estimate virtually precludes a war with Iran because it takes away the motive of stopping an ongoing nuclear program. But I don't agree with that. It certainly has reduced the probability from a very high probability to something less than that, but I think there is still a very significant likelihood. The president, who is distancing himself from the National Intelligence Estimate, he's saying he doesn't agree with it. He thinks they are still aiming at nuclear weapons despite that 16 intelligence agencies have combined to tell him the opposite. So moreover, he hasn't relied on that single excuse for over a year, from the time he knew over a year ago that they were in the process of taking away that rationale from him in the intelligence community, he and Cheney have been talking up other reasons for going to war with Iran such as alleged involvement in the Iraq war. That one is weak at the moment too, in terms of evidence from Iraq, but he could revive it at any time. We could have an incident such as the one that the Defense Department deliberately hyped up about a month ago of a supposed confrontation in the Persian Gulf, an incident that looked very much like the Tonkin Gulf incident that got us into the Vietnam War. We could have that tomorrow. They could pin up one or deliberately misinterpret this incident in the Persian Gulf. I must say there are elements in Iran in the revolutionary guard that seem to underestimate the risks to Iran of acting and speaking provocatively, and they might be willing to see war occur. I don't think that's true of the leadership in Iran, but it might not be up to them entirely.

So, I think that the risk remains significant, and indeed the fact that the President isn't running again for office may free him in his mind. I think it could happen even after the election in November in the last months of their lame duck administration. And certainly Congress has not done all they could to prevent that. Hilary Clinton signed, inexcusably, to an act calling the Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization, which as Senator James Webb pointed out, gives virtually a green light to the President to go ahead on his own discretion and attack them. She was criticized rightly for that by her campaign rivals. But nevertheless, that act is on the books. She's not the only one to blame of course; it was a senatorial action. Congress has done literally nothing to put obstacles in the way of the President acting unconstitutionally, and in their inaction, it colors him as acting with their consent which is constitutional. So, they've acted very badly on this, and the media have hardly done what they could to expose these risks. So I still believe it's a dangerous situation, yes.

CP: Can America's next military disaster be stopped today if people just come forth with information that they have?

DE: There would be no guarantee of that because we have seen a lot of examples of sufficient proof coming out thanks to people revealing it as whistleblowers with the Congress ignoring it and doing nothing about it. So there is no guarantee that telling the truth will avert these disasters. But there is a pretty good chance that these disasters will occur over time if people don't. I think it's necessary and has a chance to succeed. For example, when the national intelligence analysts a few months ago threatened to resign and go public if the new National Intelligence Estimate, which concluded that Iran was not producing nuclear weapons and had not been for some years, was not made public. If they hadn't threatened to resign, that report would not have become public, and I think we'd be closer to than we are to going to war against Iran right now.

Even so, as I said their action doesn't guarantee that the president won't just go ahead on his own terribly misguided belief that he has unlimited power as commander-in-chief, that he's virtually a king, despite the passage of the Constitution two centuries ago. That's his sincere belief, and if we let him act on that, he'll be right; it's true, he's a king. But I do think that there is information in government safes right now that would have a high chance of preventing us from a disastrous war with Iran if people would risk their careers, their clearances, and even risk going to jail by putting out this information. I think they should consider doing that. They might well suffer in their personal lives, but they might have a real chance of saving hundreds of thousands of lives.

CP: In a 2006 piece you wrote for Harper's Magazine you state that Senator Wayne Morse, one of only two senators to vote against the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, told you that by not revealing all you knew about America's involvement in Vietnam earlier, you were, in some way, accountable for horrible aspects of the war. All these years later, do you consider yourself to be partly responsible for the thousands of Vietnam War dead?

DE: Certainly, without any question. I'm glad you inserted the word “partly.” Obviously responsibilities differ and it would be grandiose of me to take the whole weight of it on as if I made all the decisions myself, or were anything but a medium-size cog in a very big machine. But yes, I was there, I was a part of it, as were we all who worked for the government, and really all the people allowed themselves to be so easily fooled with the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution in Congress. Morse is one of the few who can say he did everything he could to avert that. And I am not one of those who can say that. I've tried to learn from it. It's not a matter of making amends, but of doing better, and that's what I'm asking of people in the government now. I'm not asking them to be better than I was or better than I am, but to learn from my own bad experience of participating in wrongful war that led to many unnecessary and wrongful deaths. Many people are doing the same now. My interest is not in punishing them or even condemning them, but in making them realize they can do better than that. They can change and do better for their country and for themselves.

CP: How do you live with that?

DE: It would be harder if I felt that I had seen that clearly at the time and for personal reasons or cowardice or careerism to that I shrunk from doing that; that would be significantly harder. As it is, I can tell myself that it didn't occur to me to do that, and no one else did it, it didn't occur to any of us; it had never been done. I think that is extenuating. But I don't see it as letting me off the hook altogether. Why didn't I think more about it? Why didn't I seek more information? No, I haven't lived with a great burden of guilt, nor have I acted out of a sense of guilt. In fact I remember many years ago, my wife commenting that maybe I should feel guiltier than I do. The fact is, I do feel some sense of responsibility for having been one of those in the government who helped us get into the war. That definitely gave me a sense of obligation to do more than what others are doing to get us out of the war, and it has given me an obligation for the rest of my life to share what I've learned, and to keep other people from making the same mistakes.

CP: Is our government fundamentally untrustworthy?

DE: Oh, all governments are untrustworthy. “Trust” is not the appropriate basis for relating in a democracy. That's the very idea of democracy. Our Constitution with its provisions for separate branches for the possibility of impeachment, which is being neglected now very much, for an independent judiciary and for oversight responsibilities by Congress of the executive branch--all of these things bespeak a need for vigilance; not for trust. Or as President Reagan used to say with respect to the Russians, “trust but verify.” And Congress is failing to exercise its responsibilities under the Constitution, to exercise that oversight and to rein back and to counter an executive that is both lying, which all governments do as much as they can get away with, and moving toward executive tyranny, toward abuses. Unfortunately, we've gone so far in that direction in the last seven years, that I've come to start saying that a coup has occurred against constitutional government. The issue is not whether we avert a coup, but whether we roll back and rescind actions like the so-called Protect America Act which supposedly legalizes warrantless wiretaps, I would say that an act of Congress can not repeal the Constitution, but they're acting as if it could and as if they'd want to do that.

So, what I'm saying is not that our government is worse than other government officials, but I agree with the journalist when he says all government officials lie, and nothing they say is to be believed. That doesn't mean they're lying with everything they say, it does mean that nothing they say should be taken as the last word, or as you say, on trust. That's a wholly unwarranted suspension of disbelief. And we should be taking advantage of our constitution and our form of government of which the genius is the processes and institutions that have the chance to protect us from executive tyranny if we act them. But it takes some courage to act on them against an executive branch. And we haven’t seen much of that courage in Congress, and if we don't see more and in the public, we'll have lost our freedoms.

CP: Do you consider yourself to be a political radical?

DE: I believe in democracy. I believe that our Constitution, despite its shortcomings and flaws, which were significant, had some marvelous innovations in it. The idea that forbidding laws to be written that would protect freedom of speech and freedom of the press was an amazing political invention. It was certainly radical in its time. To your question, I'd almost have to say it's radical right now, because clearly Congress and much of the public has gotten tired of these kinds of freedoms and the courage and effort it takes to sustain them. So you could say that I am a radical democrat, small d, in that I really believe in regaining the kinds of protections and tyranny usurpation that were meant to be built into our Constitution. I would not have said there was anything radical about that when I was growing up 60 years ago, but I'm afraid it's radical now in the sense of going back to roots, and our roots are in the concept of democracy.

That's not a system I want to see change. I don't believe in a one-party system no matter what it calls itself. I don't believe in one-branch government whether it calls itself socialist, communist, capitalist, democratic, or whatever else. It's a recipe for tyranny and for wars like Vietnam and Iraq and for torture like what we are shamefully conducting right now in CIA secret prisons and Guantanamo and places that should not exist on the face of the earth, and are being tolerated by our government right now. So if that's radical, make the most of it.

Daniel Ellsberg and political science professor Larry Jacobs will discuss dissent and democracy as part of the U of M's 'Great Conversation Series.' $18.50-$23.50. 7:30 p.m. 84 Church St. SE, Minneapolis; 612.624.2345.

Posted by Ben Palosaari at February 22, 2008 7:00 AM | Comments (0)

 

Greg Marshall: 20 Years of Putting Cameras on Animals

Filed under: 3 Questions

Marine biologist Greg Marshall was scuba diving in Belize in 1986 when he saw a small fish hitching a ride from a shark simply by sucking onto its back. Marshall was inspired by what that smaller fish would get to witness by being attached to the shark and began working on a camera system that could attach to an animal and record everything the animal saw. His invention, the Crittercam, has evolved much since it was first deployed in 1987, and nature film fans and researchers continue to be dazzled by what the cameras capture. Marshall will speak on Thursday at the State Theatre about his work with the Crittercam.

Rodney the emperor penguin, equipped with a National Geographic Crittercam, gets ready to dive beneath the Antarctic ice. More Crittercam images of penguins, lions and seals in the slideshow.

City Pages: Explain to me a little about how the Crittercam works.
Greg Marshall: There are two types: the marine and the terrestrial incarnation. Most of the work we've done to date has been with the marine system. It is a system that incorporates all the video, audio, and environmental and geospatial data recording in the system. So you have to recover the system in order to get the data back since we're not able to transmit under water. So what that means is that not only does the housing have to contain all these components, it has to be rugged enough to go down to a thousand meters deep, then after it comes off the animal float back to the surface for recovery. That means we have to make the system slightly positively buoyant, very streamlined so it slips through the water easily. Then when it's sitting at the surface, a radio antenna pops out and transmits a signal, and we can triangulate on that signal and go out and pick the system up where ever it happens to be floating. From that point you can download the video, which is nowadays on flash memory, not on videotape any longer. We pre-program the system to come off at a certain time or under specific environmental conditions. For example, we know that these systems are certified for 1,000 meters, so if the animal goes to 1,000 the on board computer detects that and sends a signal then to abort the mission and release the system. And most of the deployments with a suction cup attachment mechanism, so the release is mediated by opening a valve in the suction cup, so it floods with water and releases.

There are two versions of the terrestrial system. One is much akin to the marine system in that all the data is recorded and we recover it after the deployment. The other is a video transmission system that is real time, so we can be three miles away observing what the animal is doing in real time. Those systems are totally remotely controlled, so we can get the video and audio and data transmission from up to three miles, and from five miles we can totally remotely control and interrogate the system. So by the end of the deployment, not only have we turned the system on and off during the deployment to sample behavior over time because those systems can transmit 25 or so hours of video, also at the end, we send a signal to release the entire collar from the animal, it drops off and sends a signal to us to pick it up.

CP: The Crittercam can go as deep as 3,000 feet? Can you see anything that deep?
GM: We've resolved that in a different way. In some of the systems we have on board image intensification capabilities, so we can amplify the available light 50,000 times. Even in very low light we can resolve and image. In other cases we also include a series of headlights within the system so we can project light into the water to be able to see what the animals are seeing. In all cases we're careful to do whatever we can to not change the animals' behavior because, after all, we are doing this for research and if we're changing their behavior, what's the point? So we work hard to engineer problems like that out. In a case like this with a headlight, we've tested a number of different systems and we're pretty confident that the animals we're working with can't see the color of the spectrum of the light we're using. So we're using a near infrared light that they're probably not adapted to in any case because red light absorbs so quickly into the water. So we're not affecting their behavior.

CP: What other sort of atmosphere difficulties do you face?
GM: Well obviously pressure is a huge challenge and light is a challenge. But predominantly I think in all cases the biggest challenge is to ensure that whatever we're deploying on the animal is appropriate for the animal and the research question. And that's always a challenge because it's easier for us to design and build bigger systems, it's easier for us to design and build boxier systems that don't take streamlining into consideration. We spend a lot of time and energy engineering the systems to be appropriate for the animal and the question we're trying to answer.

CP: Can you reuse the Crittercam after your retrieve them?
GM: Yeah whenever we can. Absolutely. I would imagine we've reused each system ten to 20 times. Now with these new systems, I imagine we'll reuse them, I'm hoping we can reuse them 30-50 times because they're much smaller, more robust, and we've tried to make them as universal as possible.

CP: What sort of data, besides video and audio, are gathered?
GM: We have on board temperature transducers, pressure transducers, light level meters to measure ambient light, we're measuring the accelerometry of the animal in three axis, we're measuring magnetometry- the compass direction the animal is moving in- the speed of the animal. By virtue of all of those things, when we reconstruct all those data sets, we're able to get a very coherent sense of how the animals are moving through and using their environment.

CP: What animal that you have you not been able to study with a Crittercam that you would like to?
GM: To date the systems have been too large, in my mind, to work with dolphins. I think dolphin behavior in society that is just so interesting that it's going to be absolutely fascinating for the first time to be able to work with them with our newest generation system. These new systems are 2.25 inches in diameter, and now I think for the first time appropriate for an animal the size of a dolphin and as energetic as a dolphin.

CP: I read that you were experimenting with a Crittercam you can place on birds.
GM: Yeah, that's the smallest of the terrestrial incarnations. The cameras and transmitters are quite small. So with a battery that's appropriate for the bird to carry we can do effective bird deployments. The challenge is in finding an interesting research question, everything we do is based on a research question, that you can resolve in an hour or two of transmission. That's sort of the limitation of those systems, they are only transmitting as long as the battery that animal can carry lasts, and that's a fairly small battery load.

CP: You've been recording animals with Crittercams for 20 years now, does it ever get mundane or routine? Or do you find yourself constantly learning new things?

GM: It really is the latter. We're constantly improving our capabilities, we're constantly working with new animals, and we even learn from animals we've worked with over years. We did years of work with harbor seals in Nova Scotia off the coast of Canada, and every year we learn something new. We're amazed to see behaviors that we hadn't seen before and hadn't anticipated before. It really helped us construct a whole new sense of what they're doing during the mating season, how they're feeding, what they're feeding on, and where. To paraphrase a friend and colleague, the great thing about Crittercam is that it shows you things you don't know you don't know. And that proves to be the case with most of the animals we work with. We really don't know what these animals are doing out there. We're surprised all the time.

CP: That leads to my next question. Obviously, your cameras have revealed a lot about how animals live outside of human sight, and we know so much more because of Crittercams. But do you ever worry that the cameras spoil a little of the nature's mystery?
GM: I know, it's a great question and important issue. On the one hand, yes, I mean mystery is wonderful and the mysteries of these animals is part of what inspires me to explore them and their relationship their environment. On the other hand, and I think in today's world more importantly, their world is changing so much, and the stresses they feel in their environments are changing so rapidly that in order for us to effectively understand what their basic needs are, their basic biology, we've got to be out there trying to understand them better so we can affect better conservation measures. A large part of what we do is in fact conservation biology the object is to understand these animals better to affect more effective management of the resources that they need.

CP: How many animals on any given day are outfitted with cameras around the world?
GM: We're on the verge of making it a daily event. Historically we’ve had to build these things one-off, basically designing each system and building each system as a unique unit. So historically we've had in our possession only somewhere between five and maybe 10 at any given time. Within the next month or month and a half, we're going to completing our next generation system which can be mass produced for the first time. We expect in the next year to build let's say a hundred to start off with and in the next two years maybe 500 of them. So then I'll be able to give you a better answer because then we'll have 30 projects going on at any given time around the world and we'll be able to say 'yeah, there are 50 systems deployed and tomorrow there will be 70 systems deployed.'

CP: When editing penguin tape, it is really boring to watch the video when they're standing on land, since the camera is pointed straight up, or is there always something to see?
GM: Yeah, good question, it's interesting, we use a saltwater switch, so the system turns off when they're on land and back on when they're in water, that's all controlled by the computer.

See Greg Marshall will discuss his work and innovations with Crittercam at the State Theatre Thursday. Go to www.hennepinthredistrict.org or call 612.373.5600 for more information.

Posted by Ben Palosaari at February 20, 2008 9:00 AM | Comments (0)

 

Gregory Maguire

Filed under: 3 Questions

Most famous for penning Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, which re-imagined The Wizard of Oz and was transformed into a hit Broadway musical, Gregory Maguire has carved himself a literary niche by looking at fairy tales and children's stories from a different angle. He's reworked Snow White, Cinderella, and in his latest novel, What-the-Dickens, he explores the idea of the Tooth Fairy and its relationship to youth.

City Pages: Your novels frequently look at tales and characters that are part of our collective upbringing and cultural backdrop. Why does reexamining these stories as an adult inspire you?

Gregory Maguire: Well, there's several reasons they're appealing, one is I think generally they're all good stories or have good elements or else kids wouldn't be interested in them. So the fact that I'm interested in them now because children have been interested in them is a credit to their original value. The stories that are uninteresting to kids, they don't talk about, they don't remember, and they fall out of the culture immediately. So the fact that I go back to them at all means that they’ve already been tried and true. They already have something interesting and arresting to them. But why I go back to children's stories instead of other aspects of our culture or other thoughts and observations and apprehensions of the world I have has to do partly with how fragmented of a culture we live in here in America. That is to say in this year of politics we're always talking about the great divide between the red states and the blue states, in terms of economics we talk about the divide between the haves and the have-nots, if we are interested in Marxists sensibility, we talk about the class structure, we talk about certain privileges of education, but the one thing that we share in common, despite which side of the great divide we hail each other from, is the common territory and experience of childhood. You don't have to have a political opinion when you're 6 to decide whether you like the Wizard of Oz or not. You don't have to decide the face content is of your moral struggle to believe in the Tooth Fairy when you're 5. These stories sort of predate the ways in which we distinguish ourselves as adults one from another, and therefore they are somewhat universal in a world that is rapidly losing universals. Now, as a writer, I suppose I could also add I'm a professional. I want to get the biggest bang for the buck so to speak. I want to sell my work, I want to hit the biggest audience that I can, and so therefore to use the material of childhood is to use the material that almost nobody says 'Oh, I don't know anything about that, I'm not interested.' Everybody who grew up in America has a memory of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. If you say “poison apple,” quick, what are your associations for poison apple? Or what are your associations with the words “ruby slippers” or your association with the first tooth you lost as a child? Almost every American will come up with the same response. And that means they are all together with me on the same page, the first page of a book that relies on that material as its fundament.

CP: What do you think is appealing to adult readers about revisiting the stories that they loved and learned from as children?

GM: Well frankly I think we cower in terror at the world as it is. I know I do, that's why I'm here with a closed door and my children on the other side of the door. The reality of things with global warming and An Inconvenient Truth, and the apparently inconvenient truth of the fiscal meltdown; that if you've been hearing the news today, seems to have happened in Europe and Japan and Canada, and will no doubt happen tomorrow on Wall Street. These things are really scary, and they're things we have to deal with, and we may not in fact conquer them, we may be conquered by them. So to go back to a time in which we were consolable, those stories of childhood were consoling and as children we were consolable, I think that's a legitimate function of art--to console. So I use the material at hand that's appealing to me. But I use it for the same reasons that anybody might use any material for art: to console, to challenge, to inspire, to question, and to remind people that even in the solitude of reading, we're not alone.

CP:You've taken on Cinderella, Snow White, Dorothy and Oz, and now the Tooth Fairy. Is there a fairy tale or character that you just won't take on because it would be too difficult?

GM: Well, after I had written Wicked, which was by no means my first book, it was the first book that brought me to wide public attention, I would get letters from people, including my editor saying 'Why don’t you do the back story to Alice in Wonderland? Why don't you tell us all about that?' And I said with all due respect, and with all interest in a vibrant financial life of my own, The Wizard of Oz is a wonderful story, but in some ways a story with a lot of holes in it. It's a story with a lot of useful inconsistencies. Alice in Wonderland is a major work of a genius by a major writer. Maybe Tom Stoppard doing Rosencrantz and Gilderstern Are Dead about the back story of Hamlet, maybe he has the cajones to do that, but I've got a little growing up to do yet, I'm not going to take on Alice in Wonderland. So, there are things that are so brilliant and so beautiful that I'm not going to touch them. Now, mind you, remember Michael Cunningham's book The Hours? It was very brave and nervy to say, 'I'm going to take Virginia Woolf as a character and I'm going to take her themes as my themes too, and I'm going to build a book that is at once an homage to what she was trying to do, but my own book at the same time.' Virginia Woolf too is one great figure in literary history of the last century. I'm amazed that he had the nerve, and I think he did and he succeeded. But I prefer to take material that's a little more porous. Maybe the material of childhood is more porous because it does leave out adult things like sex and greed and the thirst for power and the dark side to human life that sometimes make us seem as if we're little sprites in the dark, but the dark will always win. Because there are absences in children's stories, it provides me an easier place to find a foothold.

CP: Writing for adults and children pose different challenges, but you seem to switch target audiences at will, and sometimes, as with What-the-Dickens, you write in a way that appeals to both adults and young readers. How do you master that in-between style that snares both age groups?

GM: I used to put if not photographs of people, sometimes I would just put their names, and I would tape them to the edge of my computer screen. And I would just say to myself 'You are not writing for the National Book Award committee, you are not writing for the review editors for New York Review of Books. You are writing for toothy Burke Hutchinson, age nine, who lives halfway to the next town and is a friend of my son's. And he's nervy and smart and a normal second grade boy with his own limited experience of the world and his own limitless appetite to know what comes next.' And sometimes fastening on a specific reader or a specific set of readers will help me remember how to tell a story that is appropriate to them. So, if I put a picture of the name of a nine-year-old on my computer, I also might put a picture of my stepmother who raised me whose 90 and reads well, and taught me to read and care about language. And those are both up there themselves, then the selection process of what would be interesting to them both is part of what determines the tone and the prose style of the work.

CP:Do you think that writing for one audience is more difficult than another?

GM: Yes, I think writing for children is much harder. And this is I think because children have so many more pulls to their appetites, to their attention. When I was a kid, which was several thousand years ago now, or so it seems, we were not prosperous, so we didn't have many advantages available to prosperous families 40 years ago, but secondly, the world was not as wired as it is with video. So the competition for books was much less, there was TV, and that was about it, and my parents were pretty strict about keeping the TV off most of the time. Now when a writer is trying to get a child's attention, they know that probably the child is reading in a room with the TV on, or where the TV can be turned on with the flick of a remote control. They know that when a child goes on vacation, there are screens that descend from the inside roof of the SUV so they can watch Shrek the Third for the fortieth time. But if you're going get their attention then and keep it, you really have to use every fiber and muscle group you have as a storyteller to make it worth their while and to keep them from flinging the book out the window onto the highway and going back to Shrek the Third.

CP: How then, do would you suggest parents and teachers get children to read with all the distractions they face? How can a book compare to a friendly green ogre?

GM: It used to be that all you had to do was lock a child in a room for 18 hours with nothing but a book, no food, no water, no light. That would usually work. But the government doesn't smile on that anymore that the department of social services would come and put you in prison, so you can't do that. I think that what you really need to do is have your own personal domestic Oprah's Book Club. You have to in some way prove to children who are reluctant readers that reading is a communal activity too. Whether it be by reading the first chapter of a story out loud then having the kids go off and read the second chapter then coming back to read the third chapter out loud. There are lots of different ways you can invent to make it a collaborative effort and a source of joy and communion. Even if it's the only time in the week where kids get to drink soda in the living room, or whatever it is that kids need as a special treat to know that this is a special event. You can soup it up and hang on the whistles and bells and persuade children that the act of reading together is something that is worth celebrating. I have an intensely literary household, we too, like my parents, keep the TV turned off almost all the time except for elections and impeachments. And the house is stuffed with books. We have more books than many libraries in third-world capitol cities. But my children are not by and large different from other American children. You could put them in a room with 80 books, a truck and a doll, and they would invent a story about how the truck ran over the doll, and the doll lay bleeding on the carpet screaming for mercy, and the books would go untouched. And they would play that game over and over again until the doll began to run over the truck and the truck lay on the carpet bleeding motor oil and pleading for mercy. It is hard to get kids these days to turn and look at a book out of boredom so you have to be inventive and make a communal event, I really do think so.

CP: Your children's books have been favorites of young readers for many years now, so I'm curious, what was your favorite book as a child?

GM: There are so many stages of childhood, there are as many stages of childhood as there are of adulthood. So I would almost have to go year-by-year if not season-by-season. There was a wonderful book called A Diamond in the Window. It is what is known as a magic book or a fantasy, a domestic fantasy, a little bit Harry Potter-ish in that there are normal people who wander sideways into a world where extraordinary things happen, then wander back and have breakfast then brush their teeth and go to school. What's wonderful about it is that it takes place in Concord, Massachusetts, and it is filled with metaphors for how the mind can be expanded, how the spirit can be expanded by images of the mind. It's a transcendentalist book in a way. I read this book when I was 11, here I am at age 53, and I'm living in Concord, Massachusetts partly because the book effected me so much that I wanted to be a writer who lived in Concord and could think in metaphor, and have my life expanded over and over again by the images in my mind.

CP: You clearly have a very active imagination. Do you think most adults have an imagination as vivid as yours but they repress them, or is your imagination functioning on a higher level than other people?

GM: That is an interesting question and I have no idea what the answer is. There are ways in which we are boxed in ourselves. I don't think of myself as having a vivid imagination, I think of myself as having a slow mind. I know other people have quicker mind than mine. And one of the reasons I write is that I value the act of the mind, I value the act of thinking. And writing stories, and even writing letters and writing essays, helps me to know what I think. If I'm at a dinner party and somebody turns to me and says, 'What do you think of the nature of evil? Does it exist or not, and what is its nature?' I would say 'Please pass the asparagus,' and go to the bathroom and cry for an hour because I couldn't think of an answer. I might then set myself to task of what is the nature of evil; let me write a story so I can think about it. I don't know that I have a more vivid imagination, but I do know that, despite how glib I am and long-winded in answering your questions, I actually don't think very fast, and I write because I value thinking, and writing helps me know what I think.

CP: My last question. Back to your latest book What-the-Dickens: do your children believe in the Tooth Fairy?

GM: They do, even the 10-year-old who has already begun to sniff the dirty backstairs gossip about Santa Claus. The Tooth Fairy, perhaps because she or he comes with so much less commercial glitz, they fly in the secrecy of night, under the cover of darkness with a great many alibis, so they are easier to believe in a little bit because there is less to pin on them, there is less rhetoric. I heard my 7-year-old saying to my 6-year-old, 'I don't think there's a Tooth Fairy.' And the 6-year-old said, 'Sure there is.' And the 7-year-old said 'OK, but I wonder if daddy pushes the money under the pillow.' And the 6-year-old said, 'Look, if the Tooth Fairy is too busy, they write him a letter and say 'Would you please do this for me because I can't get there tonight.’'' And they kind of worked through that themselves, and went to bed. The 7-year-old lost a tooth and taped a quarter, a dime and a penny which he had stolen from my desk, to a note that said, 'Dear Tooth Fairy, here is $106, please leave me $200 change.' Any creature of the imagination that's going to give such a high return on investment has got to be believed, wouldn't you agree?

Posted by Ben Palosaari at January 29, 2008 5:30 AM | Comments (0)

 

Anti-Semitism Vs. Criticizing Israel

Filed under: 3 Questions

Cecilie Surasky is no stranger to being misunderstood, having her faith questioned, and giving the world her two cents. The Philadelphia native was raised in the city of brotherly love, and now she’s in the business of joining two seemingly irreconcilable peoples by stopping historically unchecked hatred and some of the worst violence human beings have committed.

Surasky is the director of communications for Jewish Voice for Peace, a San Francisco organization that calls for (gasp!) both Israeli and Palestinian concessions in order to bring about long-term peace. As often happens to those willing to compromise, Surasky and Jewish Voice for Peace are often the target of organizations and individuals with unyielding opinions on violence, sovereignty, and religion. But she weathers the criticism for what she considers the ultimate cause. “It's like the biggest topic ever!” she says of the conflict. On Thursday Surasky will bring her and JVP’s call for peace to Macalester College with a speech titled “Silencing Peacemakers in the Middle East: Anti-Semitism Vs. Criticizing Israel.”

CP: What was it about St. Thomas University’s canceling Desmond Tutu’s speech that made you so angry, that prompted you to take action?

Cecilie Surasky: There are a couple of things. Certainly Archbishop Desmond Tutu is one of the great peacemakers of our time, bar none. And he’s certainly been outspoken on human rights. The idea that he was being banned from campus and being called anti-Semitic for saying things that were documented by international human rights organizations and Israeli human rights organizations was an outrage. And it was further upsetting that there was no campaign from the Jewish community to have him banned from the university. It seemed that University of St. Thomas Fr. Dennis President Dease took this action to preemptively censor him. But the message people got was that Jews even want Tutu off campus. So that was also upsetting. In the end it actually creates more anti-Semitism and it diminishes the chances for peace to bar peacemakers from dialogue. We absolutely support dialogue, but part of what’s happening isn’t barring people and calling people anti-Semites. They’re people we desperately need to help move the peace process. And those are the people being attacked and called anti-Semites. The other piece of it is that one of the primary pieces of evidence used to condemn Archbishop Tutu was a lie. He was smeared. He was quoted as comparing Israel to Hitler and we knew that was wrong, we knew that it came from the head of a Zionist association, and we knew he never said that. And it appeared over and over again as proof that he was an anti-Semite. It’s stunning to see how this happens, but it does.

CP: What is the single action that the U.S, Palestinians or Israelis could take that would lead to increased peace?

CS: We believe that if the US suspended our military aid of three billion a year until Israel ended its occupation, that would give us the leverage for Israel to back out. Israel should just pull out to its 1967 borders. I don’t think people realize that they’re just building colonies, houses on land that isn’t theirs. It’s astounding. Imagine somebody building a walled fortress with green lawns and sometime swimming pools on your family farm. And there is nothing they can do about it. There is no compensation for people. And the Israelis are not just taking your land--they’re taking your water. The very first thing, no question, is to stop launching Quassam rockets outside of Gaza. That is their primary mechanism for terrorizing Israelis. And I would just say put a ban on killing and harming civilians for both Palestinians and Israelis. The JVP is filled with rabbis, orthodox Jews, former Israeli military--we are from the same family, the same communities, and we might have sat next to them at the same Seder. We are in every single family already, I know it.

CP: Your speech is titled “Silencing Peacemakers in the Middle East: Anti-Semitism Vs. Criticizing Israel.” Explain that a little bit. Do people confuse Jewish Voice for Peace’s stances with anti-Semitism?

CS: Most people when we get out to talk about a just and lasting peace get it. They say ‘Look, Israel is a state like the United States is a state, and they have to abide by certain laws and certain behavior.’ It’s a relatively small group and loose network that call themselves the pro-Israel lobby which is a misnomer. This is a conflict about land, and both sides need to make concessions. They think the best way to support Israel is to make sure they make no concessions. And you see this happening time and time again. There are efforts to torpedo diplomatic relations. They say this is a terrible thing for Israel. And what they’re doing is dooming Israelis and Palestinians to another hundred years of fighting. Many Israelis understand this. So what happens is this charge of ant-Semitism is used to silence people who are working for peace. This happens to people who see that it’s impossible to have a peace based on checkpoints and assassinations. You can not have peace based on that. You can’t bring peace through total submission from military domination--which is what’s happening now. So when people like Tutu and Jimmy Carter speak up about this, they level charges that you’re an anti-Semite, that you’re a self-hating Jew, you’re a terrorist. You hear these things time and time again, and they’re doing Jews a great disservice because they’ve cheapened the charge. It’s the boy who cried wolf. There’s a fear that the charge has been cheapened. There are anti-Semites out there, and it is an issue. And it makes it impossible to deal with it when you open your mouth and are called an anti-Semite. Polls show that most American Jews want concessions on both sides. What is equally pernicious is the campaign to demonize Muslims. The people we should support, who want a pluralistic society and moderate Islam--even those people are being demonized because this battle over there has been brought here to the United States. There’s this fear that any Muslim or Arab is a terrorist, and that’s dangerous. Having a difference of opinions, that’s the American way, and it’s the Israeli way. But silencing dialogue is not.

CP: What does the American Jewish population at large think of JVP? Do they see you as something of a traitor, or are you seeing more and more American Jews wanting political changes similar to those JVP is calling for?

CS: If you followed us by what American Israeli Public Affairs Committee and other groups show us to be, you’d think American Jews wanted to go to war in Iraq, and want to bomb Iran. We’re the largest religious group to oppose the War in Iraq--70 percent of Jews opposed it. A plurality of American Jews say we need to make concessions. There is a huge chasm between what American Jews think and what those who say they represent them. It’s a terrible thing that with some people, especially older generations, even saying ‘Palestinian’ or acknowledging that they exist is very emotional. I have spent time with people of every stripe politically, and we can get to a certain place politically where we agree. Nobody wants Israel to be at war forever. People think they’ve been fighting forever, but it’s a conflict over a piece of land. And that’s why it can be resolved. It has taken on religious overtones, no question, but that’s not what it’s about at the root. Yes, it’s uphill battle because it’s such an emotional issue. And JVP is growing, it used to be all-volunteer, and there are other peace groups too that are growing.

CP:Are you hopeful about the new peace talks that just started, or will this amount to one more half-hearted attempt that ultimately will be meaningless?

CS:Well, it’s absolutely easy to assume that it will fail. That’s why those of us that are deeply committed to real peace not just in name only that exploits people, have to do what we can to support it. It’s too early to say. Palestinians have been waiting generations to get out refugee camps, and Israelis have been waiting generations for some kind of sense of peace and an ability to live their lives. So we have no choice but to continue on. Yes, we have many reasons to be cynical--younger Jews are even more willing to make concessions. Our parents and grandparents’ generations have a lot of trauma, as we all do. We have fear from our experiences, and the idea of making concessions is terrifying. Younger Jews, across the board, show significant generational shifts happening. Younger Jews are much more interested in a peace that allows Palestinians to be self-determining as well as the Israelis. I am extremely hopeful about that, it’s changing and will change. It’s a big year. People are talking about negotiations, and that’s good. That’s better than when they’re not. This is our year. I would say it’s an opportunity.

CP: What do you think Americans on the whole don’t understand about the fighting in Israel? What’s the point that we just miss? Or what is the press not telling us?

CS: The no. 1 myth is that people believe that Muslims and Jews have been fighting for thousands of years--nothing could be further from the truth. What they don’t understand is that Israel is occupying land that is in a conflict. In 1967, they got it, they took possession of it, and it’s much more land that the UN charter gave them. They know they can’t annex it--they can’t legally just take it. If they took it, they’d have to give Palestinians legal rights, and they don’t want to do that because they fear they would lose the Jewish character. They’d rather have the Palestinians leave. They’ve made life there increasingly unbearable. They can come in at any time and take your home while you’re standing there screaming with your children. They have checkpoints not for safety but to make life miserable. We hear about this wall on the de facto border, which isn’t real because Israel hasn’t declared its borders. But it’s not built on the border--parts of it are built on Palestinian land, keeping some people from their own farmland. Americans know people are fighting, but they don’t realize that it’s essentially about stolen land. If people did one thing to educate themselves, they should read an Israeli newspaper for a week, read the Haaretz, it’s like the New York Times of Israel. You would be stunned to read what people openly talk about. Read it everyday for a week, and you will never see this conflict in the same way. You will feel betrayed. The American media only lets us know that people are fighting, not why. The good news is that this is not a conflict about religion; it’s about land. And if you realize that it’s about land, you realize there is a resolution. This will not go on forever.

CP: Are you optimistic that there will be peace in the region within ten years, or will it take longer? How much longer?

CS: I can’t say. Things happen overnight as we’ve learned in. In South Africa, we learned that things happen overnight, but as we also learned in South Africa, changes take decades. It’s typically American for us to get excited for a few years, and if it doesn’t happen, we move on. Palestinians and Israelis have been waiting for a solution for years, and there is no question that it is one of the biggest issues today and it will continue to impact the world until we come together and stop it. Our government has clearly failed us. We have to push them to do the right thing. What we do is important--the U.S. is so important. We’re the key to the puzzle. If we said tomorrow that we would not give Israel any money for weapons until they stop the occupation, they would have no choice but the stop. The U.S. supports the worst part of the Israeli government with massive amounts of military aid. It’s a sick process that feeds our military industry, then we dump all these weapons on Israel.

Surasky will speak at Macalester Plymouth United Church on Thursday. Her speech is sponsored by the Mideast Committee of Women Against Military Madness, and the Minnesota Chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Free; donations accepted. 7:00 p.m. 1658 Lincoln Ave., St. Paul; 612.379.3565.

Posted by Ben Palosaari at December 26, 2007 11:38 AM | Comments (22)

 

Fire Dance With Me

Filed under: 3 Questions

Steve Poreda lives something of a contradictory life. He owns a toy company, his nickname is Mr. Fun and he calls his home the 'Funhouse.' But he has a serious side too. And comes out on stage, lighted by fire. Poreda formed Illumination Fire Performance Troupe in 2000, and since then, he and his band of pyro-amorous performers have spread the art of fire dancing all over the Twin Cities. The way he talks about fire is the way a sailor talks about the sea: with great appreciation for such a beautiful thing and with a respectful amount of fear. He is says he’s spiritually connected to flames, and he wants others to see it the way he does. This Friday Illumination will perform a Winter Solstice celebration at the Cedar Cultural Center.

City Pages: How did you get into performing with fire?

Steve Poreda: I own a toy company, Mystik Toyz, and we would do a lot of festivals and events. In 1999, I was at a festival with staff, performing and teaching the toys. Some of my west coast friends working with me were performing with fire, and I was seeing them perform with fire for the first time. So as a result of my performing and juggling, it was just a natural fit to get into fire spinning and dancing. Over the past 7 years, we’ve created a fire spinning community that we’ve been harvesting through classes and events ever since. It’s something that once somebody sees, they never forget.

CP: What is the difference between fire spinning and fire dancing?
SP: Spinning and dancing. Spinning is learning, but dancing is using what you learn in an artistic way. And It manifests itself beautifully after that. And I brought what I learned to the community. It’s through non-fire props that people learn the skills.
Every other Thursday we have a spinning class with mostly non-fire props. We also hold a fire props making workshop every fall and spring. There are a lot of fire spinners in the community, but a much small percentage of them actually dance. And a handful of them are committed to the troupe.

CP: Break down of what some of the acts are.
SP: Fleshing: Body burning. It’s most commonly done with white gas, like Coleman camping fuel. But lamp oil is also popular. White gas burns white and the least odorous fuel. It’s also more combustible and it evaporates, so if you spill it, the flame doesn’t go with it. Lamp oil smells, but burns longer and has an orange flame. Sometimes you mix them if you want to have a mix of the colors. You dip your wand in the fuel, and you leave streaks of flame on your body, on your arms and on your chest. The fuel is primarily is what’s burning, but if you push harder, you’ll feel it and get a burn, no doubt. But, part of the dance move is blowing it out. It’s such a delicate art.
Pyrotechnics is the antithesis of fire dancing.
Fire poi: I’d say it’s the most familiar, the most popular. It’s the gateway prop. It’s something that, on a general level without the fire, many, many people through North America, Europe and Australia have really taken to it. It started out as poi, the Hawaiian food derived from taro root. It’s hard, so the women of the Maori people of Polynesia would gather the poi and wrap it with flax leaves. Then they would wrap a cord around it and beat it to tenderize it so they could eat it. A rhythm and song was created from the tenderizing. Artistically, it started out just spinning one, but then they started spinning more and more. The Maori traveled to Hawaii, and my theory is that the fire of the volcanoes inspired them to light the poi on fire. Modern fire poi is Kevlar wicking with a bolt and pin in it, with a chain attached. Then it’s dipped in gas and set on fire. It allows you to engulf yourself in a circle of flame.
Fire Eating: The worst thing you can do is inhale. You smother the flame by exhaling on it gently while the flame is in your mouth. After that, you can light another torch with the fumes in your mouth.

CP: What sort of clothing or cosmetic safety guidelines do fire performers follow?
SP: A lot of us have long hair, and we’re not cutting our hair for it. So, for your head, wet down your hair and body and it’s a good idea to wear some kind of headpiece. My partner usually covers her hair with a bandanna. Most of us hippies don’t wear hairspray, but any chemicals should be avoided. Leather, not only looks cool but is practical. I usually wear light leather pants, and sleeveless shirts. For the most part, it is safe if done correctly.

CP: What is worst injury you’ve sustained or witnessed from fire performing?
SP: Cori, Illumination’s choreographer, she was wearing loose skirt and one of the people next to her caught her skirt on fire. Then, trying smother the flame, they wrapped her skirt but wrapped her up in it. Really they should have torn skirt off. The fire spotter, the person responsible for watching for dangerous situations, wants to swipe the fire off, not smother it. Cori got some second-degree burns from that accident.

CP: Tell me about the Winter Solstice Drum, Dance and Fire Jam at the Cedar Cultural Center on December 21.
SP: Illumination is participating, but the solstice is more about a community event. It’s a very rooted, organic experience. There’s this dichotomy of dark and light. It’s the darkest night of the year, and we bring the light.

CP: It seems like frightening job, do you ever get scared?
SP: No. I feel that fear can lead to hesitation. And I feel that hesitation leads people to stumble and it takes you out of your moment. There is always the slight element of fear, I’m conscious of it. But the fear takes you in. it takes the audience’s attention and it takes the fire dancer’s attention. You have to be more alert and clear minded and focused. The more alert you are, the safer you’ll be and the more beautiful your dance will be.

CP: What do your friends and family think of your profession?
SP: To tell you the truth, they’re not surprised. I’ve had a very interesting life and my family and friends and community have always supported me. My immediate family is kind of like ‘Oh there he goes again.’ But they’re not afraid for me. They’ve come to understand over the years that to know me is to trust in all the crazy things I’ve done in my life. And they see that this is supporting something beyond myself. It’s building and inspiring community such that people will carry on this flame metaphorically. We need a spark in our life. The fire is certainly an element that is 100% creation and 100% inspiration. And it’s so symbolic. When you sit around a fire with your friends or family, you feel grounded. We connect with it. It brings that out of us. And when we dance with it, we bring that grounded energy and you’re manifesting a language.

CP: What is the appeal of playing with fire? It’s dangerous and difficult, why do you put yourself through that?
SP: It really gets people’s attention. You can reach somebody on a deeper level, on a spiritual level, and they might not even see it that way. I believe that the nature of the act of fire dancing is something that will transform other people.

CP: What are you suggestions for anybody who wants to get into fire performing?
SP: Use local resources, for instance, take one of my lessons through community education. If you feel drawn to it, observe it and observe what that person performing is expressing through their fire dance. If you’re intuitive, you can learn from what they’re dancing.

See Poreda and the Illumination Fire Performance Troupe at the Cedar’s Winter Solstice Drum, Dance, and Fire Jam. Those attending are encouraged to bring their own drums and participate.

Posted by Ben Palosaari at December 20, 2007 10:06 AM | Comments (0)

 

3 Questions: Cesar "The Dog Whisperer" Millan

Filed under: 3 Questions

If you've been to a dog park recently, chances are you've noticed a bizarre trend among pup owners: They've taken to calling themselves "pack leaders" and admonishing their charges' bad behavior with an air compressor-like "tsst" noise. Thank Cesar Millan, a.k.a. "The Dog Whisperer," for this development. No really, thank him: Through his much-loved National Geographic Channel show The Dog Whisperer, Millan—pet trainer to the stars and founder of L.A.'s the Dog Psychology Center—has done more for problematic pet behavior than a landfill of choke collars (which he disavows in favor of exercise and assertive leadership). Millan is in the Twin Cities filming new episodes, and he appears tomorrow at PETCO in Maplewood for a question-and-answer session. He was kind enough to answer CP's questions in advance.

City Pages: Were you born with an innate understanding of animal behavior, or is it the result of years of rigorous training?

Cesar Millan: I have a lifetime of experience working with thousands of dogs. My training comes from being around animals my whole life, learning from my grandfather at a young age how not to work against Mother Nature. I have worked with literally thousands of dogs. My methods achieve results, but as you will see me say in the show, it is up to the owners to make it a success in the long term. I guess you could also say I have an instinctual ability to relate to dogs. I understand the way dogs socially interact—I am able to understand the world from a dog's point of view. My method uses exercise, discipline, and then affection to bring balance to a dog. I practice using calm and assertive energy in working with dogs.

CP: Have you ever met a dog you couldn't control?

CM: Very rarely. Sometimes a dog actually has a neurological condition, which is very sad, and there is really nothing you can do. But 99 percent of the dogs I have encountered I have been able to rehabilitate. The number of owners I am able to train, well, that is a different story.

CP: I can't go to the dog park anymore without hearing someone doing that "tsst" thing. Does it work on other animals as well? What about noisy neighbors? Unruly children?

CM: It's funny that you ask. People actually ask me this all the time. I have even had wives say they use it on their husbands. But for me, it is what works on the dog world.

The Dog Whisperer airs Friday nights at 7:00 p.m. on the National Geographic Channel. Cesar Millan appears Saturday, June 2, at PETCO. Free. 1:00 p.m. 7040 Valley Creek Plaza, Woodbury; 651.739.9122.

Posted by Chuck Terhark at June 1, 2007 11:26 AM | Comments (20)

 

Combat robots invade Eagan!

Filed under: 3 Questions

Man vs. machine is so boring; machine vs. machine, though—now that's a little more like it. This weekend, months (in some cases, years) of toiling to produce the ultimate battle 'bot will come to fruition (or ruin) when machines with names like the Defyer, Mangler, and Eugene battle for mechanical dominance at Mechwar 10. City Pages recently took a moment to chat with Steven Murphy, member of Team Rusty Nuts, which helms the mighty Mangler.

City Pages: These machines look so complex. Is robot battling an expensive hobby to get into?

Steven Murphy: It is an affordable hobby depending on how creative you are. Some can do it for a little, some use an extreme amount of resources. Certainly a sponsor helps. We have one, but we've done it mostly ourselves. It takes a lot of planning, trying out different ideas, prototypes, and luck.

CP: Is it hard to watch all your hard work get destroyed by another robot?

SM: I've witnessed some younger competitors get upset when their work is destroyed. They're probably a little too close to their robot—it's become a model of them somehow. My team's philosophy is: We built it for combat. We expect it to either come out the champion or completely destroyed. Part of the joy is building the robot, the camaraderie, the team. The whole process is what makes it great. Making an idea into something tangible.

CP: RoboCop versus Terminator. Who wins?

SM: I would have to say Terminator, because RoboCop is sort of a cyborg human and machine, and Terminator is all machine. And Terminator has a little bit more attitude I think.

See Steven Murphy and the rest of Team Rusty Nuts put Mangler to the test in Mechwar 10 at the Eagan Civic Arena, Saturday, May 19. $5/$8 at the door. 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. For more info call 612.743.5971 or visit www.tcmechwars.com. 3870 Pilot Knob Rd., Eagan.

Posted by Jessica Armbruster at May 16, 2007 10:35 AM | Comments (1)

 

Valleyfair careens down memory lane with the Renegade

Filed under: 3 Questions

Wooden roller coasters aren't as fast as their famous steel counterparts, nor can they fling riders threw corkscrewy twists and upside-down turns. And yet more and more amusement parks are building them—and not just to cash in on Baby Boomer sentimentalism. "Woodies" are often just as scary as steel coasters, for the simple reason that flying on rails supported by what amounts to a giant pile of toothpicks is enough to make you fear for your life. City Pages recently caught up with Jan Guthridge of Valleyfair, which unveils its new wooden coaster, Renegade, today.

City Pages: There seems to be a new wooden roller coaster trend in amusement parks. Why is that?

Jan Guthridge: Wood coasters have unique characteristics over steel coasters. With steel coasters you have a much smoother ride, whereas on a wood coaster you feel more of the ride. The superstructure of a wood coaster makes it look very impressive. At the same time, it's nostalgic. The first roller coasters were made of wood.

CP: How does Renegade stack up against other famous wooden roller coasters, like the Cyclone or Texas Giant?

JG: It's yet to be determined since we haven't ridden it yet. We anticipate it'll be a ver