1.
For an uplifting performance of music, my long-time pal Kelley Hunt will be presenting her 56th (yow!) Facebook Connection Concert tomorrow (Saturday) night, January 29th. With the spread of the virus, especially in Kansas where Kelley lives, she felt it was time to hunker down once again. Performing to an imaginary audience is no easy task but Kelley brings it on as if she’s in a concert hall, y’all. Check it out if you can!
2.
I had not heard of The Mexican Suitcase until last week over dinner with friends who lived in Spain for twenty five years, one of whom is the bassist I currently work with in both my band and with Kevin Pakulis. Rolls of film by photographers Robert Capa (Endre Freidmann), Gerda Taro, and Chim (David Seymour) of the Spanish Civil War (1936 to 1939) were long thought lost. But in December 2007, three boxes containing 4,500 35mm negatives arrived at the International Center of Photography (Cornell Capa founded ICP in 1974 to champion “concerned photography”—socially and politically minded images that can educate and change the world).
In short, the story of the Mexican Suitcase is not about a single suitcase but about several boxes that went missing when Capa had to leave Paris in a hurry, at the height of the Second World War, in 1939, to avoid being captured by the Germans. He left the huge cache of negatives with his darkroom manager, Imre Weisz. Weisz stated that he had attempted to ship the images to Mexico after having traveled on a motorcycle to Bordeaux with the negatives inside a rucksack. Weisz never made it out and he was interred in Morocco until 1941. Somehow, the negatives landed in the hands of General Francisco J. Aguilar González, who happened to be the Mexican ambassador to the Vichy government in France. The boxes with the negatives were finally discovered by Mexican filmmaker Benjamin Tarver in the 1990s. He happened to inherit the negatives from his aunt who happened to be a close friend of General Aguilar González. Capa’s biographer, Richard Whelan, and ICP chief curator Brian Wallace worked closely with Trisha Ziff, an independent film curator and filmmaker living in Mexico, who went to convince Tarver that the negatives belonged to the ICP archives, and were eventually delivered there in 2007.
Here’s a short synopsis of the journey of the suitcase negatives:
Click here to view the full documentary.
3.
The state politics in my home state, Kansas, and my adopted state, Arizona, seem to be follow a similar trajectory. The GOP gerrymandering goes on unabated in both states, and in Kansas right now, Republicans used their supermajority in the Kansas House Tuesday to give first-round approval to a redistricting plan that would likely make it harder for U.S. Rep. Sharice Davids, the state’s lone Democrat in Congress, to win reelection this year. The new map would make Lawrence, a mostly blue oasis in the red sea, a political anomaly by drawing the map to include it — and the University of Kansas — in the sprawling 1st Congressional District. It covers the western two-thirds of the state, circling around Wichita and a handful of surrounding counties, which comprise the 4th District. Rep. Steve Huebert, a Valley Center Republican, undermined that argument during the House debate when he said that Republicans needn’t apologize for trying to strengthen their already strong political hand. “There’s nothing new under the sun,” he said. “What we’re doing has been done before and will be done again.”
Of the whole process, Rep. Boog Highberger, D-Lawrence said, “What a great session it has been so far. First I catch COVID here, and now this. And if I had to choose between the two, I’d stick with COVID, frankly.”
Mark Desetti, upon retiring recently after spending 23 legislative sessions working as governmental relations director for the Kansas National Education Association, says the Statehouse is a toxic environment. He went on to say, When I am faced with a supermajority of legislators who don’t care about humanity, it’s time to go. When faced with a majority of voters who apparently are fine with this, it’s time to go. For these reasons — and the fact that I long to experience less stress and more joy — I have given up and retired. May God bless Kansas, although I fear such a blessing might be too little, too late. The GOP will not allow a voice for working people; they will not allow poor people to get health care; they will not allow women to control their own bodies or teachers to teach honestly about history or LGBTQ people to live their own lives freely.
In last December’s remapping in Arizona, one of the most bitterly divided swing states, finalized a new congressional map that could hand the GOP six of its nine congressional districts in 2022. Even thought the state went for Biden and is trending blue, the GOP mapped out a layout that creates two true swing seats in the suburbs of Phoenix and Tucson — currently held by GOP Rep. David Schweikert and retiring Democratic Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick — while very possibly dooming Democratic Rep. Tom O'Halleran in the northeast half of the state. O’Halleran says he’ll run for reelection in 2022 despite a newly approved redrawn Arizona congressional district seen as more favorable for a Republican opponent. Let the games begin.
4.
Yikes, them thar immigrants are coming to take away my job! Immigration opponents such as Senator Tom Cotton continue to claim immigrant workers will push our workers into unemployment lines. And the orange man said "When Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best. They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They're rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”
But even the conservative site The Hill says that Decades of comprehensive analyses show that immigrants improve the domestic economy and raise incomes for Americans. They reduce unemployment and have little to no negative effect on the wages of native born workers. Skilled immigrants particularly benefit the economy as they raise wages for native born workers.
An article in Bigthink says A review of the data showed that, no matter how you define immigrant or non-immigrant founded firms, immigrants tend to start more businesses of every size on a per-person basis. The first two data sets suggested that an immigrant is 80% more likely to become an entrepreneur than a native-born individual in the same workforce. While the data does shift a bit with changes in the definition of “immigrant founded,” the general finding remains true.
Additionally, as immigrants to the U.S. are more likely to hold degrees in STEM fields, it may come as no surprise that businesses that immigrants create are 35% more likely to have a patent than those founded exclusively by the native born.There was also some evidence that immigrant-founded firms pay more, but this difference was minor after controlling for a number of variables.
You may find this video interesting which features Robert Steven Kaplan, the President and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, saying While it’s very controversial and a sensitive subject, obviously, we’re going to need to come to grips in this country at some point with immigration reform that helps us find a way to grow immigration. And I believe that is going to be an essential element also of growing the workforce in the years ahead.
5.
So, McConnell issued the following statement on the announced retirement of Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer yesterday: Justice Breyer commands respect and affection across the legal world, including from those who disagree with his judicial philosophy and conclusions in cases. This respect is rooted in Justice Breyer’s intelligence, rigor, and good-faith scholarly engagement. By all accounts, both personally and professionally, he has rendered exemplary service on our nation’s highest Court. Justice Breyer’s commitment to the importance of a nonpartisan, non-politicized judiciary has been especially admirable. Even in the face of undue criticism from the modern political left, Justice Breyer has remained a principled voice against destructive proposals such as partisan court-packing that would shatter public trust in the rule of law.
Then, somehow his head did not break out into hives and burst into flames when he uttered Looking ahead — the American people elected a Senate that is evenly split at 50-50. To the degree that President Biden received a mandate, it was to govern from the middle, steward our institutions, and unite America. The President must not outsource this important decision to the radical left. The American people deserve a nominee with demonstrated reverence for the written text of our laws and our Constitution.
The radical left? What is this thing he speaks of? Let’s see, who was it that said he wasn't going to let President Barack Obama fill Scalia’s seat two minutes after he was embalmed? Who was it who blocked Merrick Garland, a centrist by any light, for a year? Then, to add to the steaming pile that is Mister Kentucky, he abolished the filibuster and handed life tenure to three hard-Right justices who could never have gotten 60 votes, one of whom is a beer-guzzling womanizer. And now, he has the temerity to open his gob and spout that The American people deserve a nominee with demonstrated reverence for the written text of our laws and our Constitution.
I blame Hilary’s emails.
6.
While we’re all snoozing, book banning is happening more frequently. A conservative group in Bartow, Florida, comprised of people who don’t read books most likely, have pushed the Polk County Public Schools to place sixteen books “in quarantine so a thorough, thoughtful review of their content can take place.” Because, you know, Toni Morrison’s Beloved is pornographic. And the McMinn County School Board in Tennessee decided Jan. 10 to remove Art Spiegelman’s “Maus” from its curriculum. Glad I have my original copy. And in Cheyenne, Wyoming, Darin Smith, a local attorney and former Republican congressional candidate whose wife is on the school board, said “If you put pictures to the material that was read, our superintendent would be in jail for trafficking in kiddie porn. I would never have known these extreme leftists that are controlling our school district had I not gone to voice my opposition to the masking.” Mendee Cotton, a grandparent of seven local students, told the Cheyenne school board while scratching her armpits that what was in the books was “pornography, pedophilia” and parents wouldn’t stop until they were gone. “The sleeping giant is awake. You affected our kids and now we are angry,” she said. “Make no mistake, this is a war.”
And now…today’s ‘cartoon’ quotes are from the Iranian-born French graphic novelist, cartoonist, illustrator, film director, and children's book author Marjane Satrapi. Arizona Daily Star’s Dave Fitzsimmons recently penned on Facebook: What we are seeing is the political rise of the rural, religious and uneducated over the urban, secular, and educated citizenry. I'm paraphrasing the words of Marjane Satrapi, an Iranian cartoonist. She was describing the Revolution of the Ayatollahs that crushed her nation in 1979. America is gripped by the Taliban of Trumpism. It will be with us a long time here in Arizona-stan. They're destroying public education, oppressing women and denying science. And this crusade marching backwards into the Dark Ages is funded by a few cynical millionaires and billionaires who will profit from cultivated ignorance.
To hell in a hand basket. And I blame Hillary’s emails too!
Thanks for the piece on The Mexican Suitcase. Just an awesome story and what a trove of historical photographs to get lost in and to learn from.🙏