Will you please help me return to Salem?
With Labor Day just around the corner, the 2008 election cycle is in full swing. I am focused on building a campaign that will lead to victory in November.
In my first full term in the Legislature, I passed Karly’s Law which made Oregon kids safer through improved child abuse investigations. I helped families stay together by creating a Medicaid waiver for kids with significant disabilities, and by passing a law that demands insurance companies treat families raising children with special needs fairly. I co-sponsored a bill to expand access to birth control to Oregon women, and we created Oregon’s first general purpose Rainy Day Fund. I sponsored and passed the largest regulatory streamlining initiative for the construction industry in the nation and I was also proud to vote for the best budgets for K-12 schools, community colleges and universities in over a decade.
As Assistant Majority Leader for Policy, I helped develop and deliver positive solutions to Oregon’s toughest challenges. My goal in 2009 is to advance in leadership so that I can have greater opportunities to shape the broader agenda for Oregon’s future.
There is so much work to be done in 2009 and beyond. We need to make our community colleges and universities more affordable. We need to proactively address the issue of climate change, and invest in economic development projects that bring more good paying jobs to Oregon. We must be prepared to meet the needs of the men and women returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, and we must move forward on real health care reform that delivers high quality, affordable, accessible health care to every Oregonian. I want to return to Salem to do this work.
In order to meet my goals, I need to raise another $20,000 in the coming weeks.
Please help me meet that goal so that I can continue the work I have begun. Your online contribution today of $25, $50, $100 or more will help me meet that goal and achieve success in November. Please click here to visit Act Blue and make whatever contribution you can afford today. Then please forward this email to your friends and family to see if they can help, too.
Every contribution makes a difference, and the next two weeks of fundraising are critical to success in November!
To learn more about my campaign and my vision for Oregon, please visit my brand new campaign website . You can also email me directly at sgelser@yahoo.com . I am happy to answer any questions you may have.
It is a privilege to serve in the Oregon House. It is an opportunity I would not have without your support. Thank you so much for the chance to do this work.

Sincerely,
Sara Gelser

P.S. Remember, Oregon allows a tax credit for political contributions of up to $50 for an individual or $100 for a couple each year. This means the first $50 or $100 you contribute to a political campaign may come back to you in April!

P.P.S. Contributions, payable to Sara Gelser for State Representative, can also be mailed to 1804 SW Brooklane Drive, Corvallis, OR 97333 in care of my treasurer, Barbara Sackett. Thank you for your support!
UPCOMING EVENTS:
August 11, 2:30-3:30pm: Coffee with Sara in Corvallis. Come join me at Sunnyside Up for an informal conversation about the fall campaigns, and the upcoming Legislative Session. Bring your questions, concerns and bill ideas!
September 14, Corvallis: Rock for Barack. This outdoor concert event will feature state and local candidates, as well as the local Obama campaign. Bring your family! More information will be available soon.
September 17: Corvallis House Builder Event at Sara Gelser's home. Featuring Rep. Gelser, House Majority Leader Dave Hunt and other House Democrats, this event will highlight key legislative races on the November ballot across the state of Oregon. The fundraiser will benefit FuturePAC, the political committee for the Oregon House Democrats. Please email Sara at sgelser@yahoo.com for more information.
October 5: Win-PAC Brunch at Sara Gelser's home. Join Rep. Gelser, Ways and Means C0-Chair Mary Nolan and Rep. Tina Kotek for this event which will focus on improving women's leadership opportunities in Oregon. The fundraiser will benefit Win-PAC, which is devoted solely to supporting first time, pro-choice, Demcoratic women candidates running for the Oregon Legislature. For more information, please email Sara at sgelser@yahoo.com
October 7, 7pm, Corvallis Public Library: Health Care Forum, sponsored by Mid-Valley Health Care Advocates. This forum will feature Benton County Democratic and Republican candidates for the Legislature, and is focused specifically on health care issues. For more information, please contact Betty Johnson at bjonnson2@juno.com
October 8, 9am-10am: Coffee with Sara in Philomath. Please join me at Java Connection in Philomath for an informal conversation about the fall campaign and the upcoming Legislative Session. Bring your questions, concerns and bill ideas!
October 14, 7pm, Corvallis Public Library: League of Women Voters Town Hall Candidate Forum . This moderated forum will feature all Benton County Candidates for the Oregon Legislature.
October 29, 1pm, Legacy Emmanuel Hospital in Portland: Rep. Gelser delivers Keynote Address at the statewide Shaken Baby Syndrome Prevention Conference

The committee which planned the Corvallis Music History Project's Phase 1 is assembling the information gathered from musicians at the event and is distributing the funds received from the public. The cinematographer and television editors are editing their footage from the 3 cameras to present a coherent picture of the performances, and that will be released shortly. A number of musicians are hoping to se their performances to bolster their résumés so they can eat a little better and we are doing that as quickly as possible. The tentative photo documentation of the event will be added here as time permits. .A meeting to discuss what worked and what didn't in the event will be held shortly. Stay tuned.

High in the hills of Guatemala, shut inside the one-room house where he spends day and night on a twin bed beneath a seriously outdated calendar, Luis Alberto Jiménez has no idea of the legal battle that swirls around him in the lowlands of Florida.Shooing away flies and beaming at the tiny, toothless elderly mother who is his sole caregiver, Mr. Jiménez, a knit cap pulled tightly on his head, remains cheerily oblivious that he has come to represent the collision of two deeply flawed American systems, immigration and health care. Eight years ago, Mr. Jiménez, 35, an illegal immigrant working as a gardener in Stuart, Fla., suffered devastating injuries in a car crash with a drunken Floridian. A community hospital saved his life, twice, and, after failing to find a rehabilitation center willing to accept an uninsured patient, kept him as a ward for years at a cost of $1.5 million. What happened next set the stage for a continuing legal battle with nationwide repercussions: Mr. Jiménez was deported — not by the federal government but by the hospital, Martin Memorial. After winning a state court order that would later be declared invalid, Martin Memorial leased an air ambulance for $30,000 and “forcibly returned him to his home country,” as one hospital administrator described it. Since being hoisted in his wheelchair up a steep slope to his remote home, Mr. Jiménez, who sustained a severe traumatic brain injury, has received no medical care or medication — just Alka-Seltzer and prayer, his 72-year-old mother said. Over the last year, his condition has deteriorated with routine violent seizures, each characterized by a fall, protracted convulsions, a loud gurgling, the vomiting of blood and, finally, a collapse into unconsciousness. “Every time, he loses a little more of himself,” his mother, Petrona Gervacio Gaspar, said in Kanjobal, the Indian dialect that she speaks with an otherworldly squeak. Mr. Jiménez’s benchmark case exposes a little-known but apparently widespread practice. Many American hospitals are taking it upon themselves to repatriate seriously injured or ill immigrants because they cannot find nursing homes willing to accept them without insurance. Medicaid does not cover long-term care for illegal immigrants, or for newly arrived legal immigrants, creating a quandary for hospitals, which are obligated by federal regulation to arrange post-hospital care for patients who need it. American immigration authorities play no role in these private repatriations, carried out by ambulance, air ambulance and commercial plane. Most hospitals say that they do not conduct cross-border transfers until patients are medically stable and that they arrange to deliver them into a physician’s care in their homeland. But the hospitals are operating in a void, without governmental assistance or oversight, leaving ample room for legal and ethical transgressions on both sides of the border.Indeed, some advocates for immigrants see these repatriations as a kind of international patient dumping, with ambulances taking patients in the wrong direction, away from first-world hospitals to less-adequate care, if any. “Repatriation is pretty much a death sentence in some of these cases,” said Dr. Steven Larson, an expert on migrant health and an emergency room physician at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. “I’ve seen patients bundled onto the plane and out of the country, and once that person is out of sight, he’s out of mind.” Hospital administrators view these cases as costly, burdensome patient transfers that force them to shoulder responsibility for the dysfunctional immigration and health-care systems. In many cases, they say, the only alternative to repatriations is keeping patients indefinitely in acute-care hospitals. “What that does for us, it puts a strain on our system, where we’re unable to provide adequate care for our own citizens,” said Alan B. Kelly, vice president of Scottsdale Healthcare in Arizona. “A full bed is a full bed.” Medical repatriations are happening with varying frequency, and varying degrees of patient consent, from state to state and hospital to hospital. No government agency or advocacy group keeps track of these cases, and it is difficult to quantify them. A few hospitals and consulates offered statistics that provide snapshots of the phenomenon: some 96 immigrants a year repatriated by St. Joseph’s Hospital in Phoenix; 6 to 8 patients a year flown to their homelands from Broward General Medical Center in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.; 10 returned to Honduras from Chicago hospitals since early 2007; some 87 medical cases involving Mexican immigrants — and 265 involving people injured crossing the border — handled by the Mexican consulate in San Diego last year, most but not all of which ended in repatriation. Over all, there is enough traffic to sustain at least one repatriation company, founded six years ago to service this niche — MexCare, based in California but operating nationwide with a “network of 28 hospitals and treatment centers” in Latin America. It bills itself as “an alternative choice for the care of the unfunded Latin American nationals,” promising “significant saving to U.S. hospitals”.

Above: One of the chidren helped by CF. Two weeks after federal agents raided the largest Iranian charity in Oregon, employees at Child Foundation have regained possession of their seized cell phones and fax machines. But the feds are still holding the charity’s computers and remaining silent about the reasons behind a raid that’s alarmed Iranians locally and on the Internet after bloggers published Willamette Weekly’s account of the raid. Online comments ranged from fear of an Orwellian crackdown on Iranian-Americans to speculation about whether Child Foundation was violating tightened U.S. economic sanctions against Iran. “I would like the Iranian-American community…to follow this case closely and seek answers,” writes Jahanshah Javid on Iranian.com, a U.S. website about Iranian news and culture. Until this week, it was a mystery even which agency was responsible for the July 15 raid at the charity’s headquarters at 1220 SW Morrison St. But foundation attorney Jeremy Sacks tells WW that it was the U.S. Attorney’s Office with the help of the FBI. Sacks, a lawyer with the Stoel Rives firm in Portland, otherwise declined to comment, except to say Child Foundation is cooperating with the ongoing investigation. Local FBI spokeswoman Beth Anne Steele referred questions to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Portland. But Assistant U.S. Attorney Kent Robinson, head of the criminal division in the Portland office, has so far refused to comment. The Portland-based charity connects sponsors with poor children in the Middle East. Its five-member board of directors and office manager are all Iranian-Americans. The 14-year-old charity does most of its work in Iran but also helps kids in Iraq, Afghanistan, Indonesia, Turkey and the United States, according to its website. Navid Agha Seyedali, a member of the foundation’s board of directors, tells WW the raid targeted the charity’s financial data. He stressed that there have been no charges brought and no allegations of wrongdoing. Seyedali, a Boeing consultant who lives in Seattle, said the charity expects to have its computers back later this week after the feds finish copying the data. But he’s unsure when the investigation will be complete. “The government is interested to know that the funds we have received from people have been distributed legally,” Seyedali says. “Since we have been basically in the business of supporting children in Iran, and it is under U.S. sanctions, they would like to know that we have complied with all the laws and regulations.” Iran is under strict sanctions that require even nonprofits to have a license from the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control. In most cases charities can provide only material support such as food and medical supplies to people in Iran, though some licenses are granted for money transfers into the country. Such restrictions make it difficult for charities to operate effectively, says Katayoon Shaya, president of the nonprofit Children of Persia based in Montgomery Village, Md. Her group has no license and is restricted to helping kids in America who come from Iran for medical care. “If you’ve got a cause that you deeply care for, and it takes funding to accomplish, it certainly is very, very difficult, because you can’t send funds,” she says. The rules tightened even further a year ago, when President Bush issued an executive order freezing the assets of anyone suspected of undermining “economic reconstruction and political reform in Iraq.” Civil libertarians feared the rule would be used to attack charities in Iran, a country the White House accuses of aiding the Iraq insurgency. A Treasury Department spokeswoman told the website Talking Points Memo that the new rule would not be used against groups “donating money to orphans,” which is exactly what Child Foundation was set up to do. Seyedali says Child Foundation’s license allows it to send only food to Iran. Treasury Department spokesman Andrew DeSouza says he can’t confirm whether Child Foundation or any other charity has such a license. The Child Foundation website says it helps talented kids stay in school and go to college, sending a social worker to assess their needs and then matching them with sponsors. What sort of help the children get is never outlined specifically on the website, and even Seyedali, when first asked, was uncertain what assistance is provided. Neda Soofi, a Portland lawyer who sponsors a 10-year-old girl in Iran, says she remains confident in Child Foundation after the raid. “As far as I know,” she says, “they have always done what they said they would do, and I trust them.”

How to Win the Online Mcgraw Hill Business Strategy Game
A History of the Canadian Dominion, William McGillivray and the Canadian Clique
History of Russians in the Pacific Northwest
The Basics of Making Cheese
Lyman Beecher and the Second Great Awakening
Bus Schedules
The Tulsa Race Riots
An Inquisition Torture Session
History of Mathematics in India
Corvallis dogs and Jack London's Call of the Wild
Corvallis Serial Killers
Thomas Egarton Hogg and Corvallis
The Modoc Indian War in Oregon
The fur trade in the Northwest
Imprisonment of OSU students 1942
The History of Astoria and Washington Irving's Trip to Oregon

 The Oregon House Democrats unveiled their list of priorities for the 2009 Legislature on Monday. It includes a commitment to raising the state's $10 corporate minimum tax and help for college students. Majority Leader Dave Hunt, the Gladstone Democrat who hopes to be Speaker in 2009, was also quick to say that Democrats took a conservative approach in compiling their to-do list. "We're not going to overpromise," Hunt told reporters attending a capitol news conference. Oregon's $10 corporate minimum tax is the only tax change mentioned in the Democrats' list. Under improving "health care access and affordability," Democrats pledge to fund in-home and assisted living care programs for seniors and people with disabilities. Notably absent was specific mention of a Healthy Kids plan to make sure more Oregonian children are insured or raising the state's cigarette tax to pay for it. Hunt explained that House Democrats await recommendations from the Health Fund Board, which was charged with drafting a comprehensive reform plan for the state. "I think the cigarette tax will be in play next session," he said. Other items on the list include continued investment in providing round-the-clock Oregon state trooper coverage and investment in worker training programs. Democrats currently have a 31-29 majority advantage in the House. Hunt confidently predicted Monday that the Ds will have more than 31 seats in 2009. House Republicans also recently released their agenda for "Building a Better Oregon." Republicans say they will make the state's income tax fairer for moderate and low-income Oregonians and increase Oregon's child tax credit.

The Bush administration’s latest plan for saving the northern spotted owl from extinction while allowing a boost in old growth logging was better, but still not good enough, according to three leading professional organizations of wildlife scientists.      The Wildlife Society, the Society for Conservation Biology and the American Ornithologists Union said in peer reviews Monday that the final plan adopted in May was better than the draft they flunked a year ago, but there was still no scientific basis for allowing more logging of the old growth forests where the threatened bird lives.      “Given that the northern spotted owl has been experiencing about a 4 percent annual rate of population decline for the last 15 years, any reductions from current levels of habitat protection cannot be justified,” the joint review by the Society for Conservation Biology and American Ornithologists Union said.      The reviews estimated the recovery plan allows for destruction of 20 percent to 56 percent of the spotted owl habitat currently protected.      The spotted owl was declared a threatened species in 1990 due primarily to heavy logging in the old growth forests where it nests and feeds in Washington, Oregon and Northern California. Lawsuits from conservation groups led to a reduction of more than 80 percent in logging on federal lands.      Working with the timber industry under a lawsuit settlement, the Bush administration has been trying to increase logging levels, but has repeatedly been stymied by court rulings.      The owl recovery plan produced by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is a key underpinning of plans by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management to ramp up logging in Western Oregon old growth forests.      A new threat from the barred owl, a native of the Eastern United States that has pushed spotted owls out of their territory, has led to arguments from the timber industry that it is no longer necessary to protect so much old growth if there are no spotted owls living in it.      The Wildlife Society warned that going ahead with this recovery plan would dismantle the Northwest Forest Plan, adopted in 1994 to protect national forest habitat for the owl, salmon, and other species, and would likely lead to a “nightmare” scenario of more species going on the endangered species list and Fish and Wildlife losing its credibility.      The Society for Conservation Biology and American Ornithologists Union said the latest recovery plan was an improvement over the last effort, but was still inadequate for restoring healthy spotted owl populations because it would allow the loss of more habitat to logging.      After the draft plan was flunked a year ago, Fish and Wildlife redrafted it, reducing the emphasis on threats from the barred owl and providing for more habitat protection.

Hi Kids!
Friday the 1st we are holding over the amazing MONGOL, THE FALL, and
the Martin Scorsese documentary about the Rolling Stones:SHINE A LIGHT. Yes, it will be loud.

Starting Friday the 1st we will be bringing in the dead-pan comedy THE PROMOTION with John C. Reilly.

Coming sooner or later, probably. . . .

Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson
MAN ON A WIRE

FROZEN RIVER
BRICK LANE
WHEN DID YOU LAST SEE YOUR FATHER?

Playing Friday, July 18th thru Thursday, July 24th (click a link to jump to the section).
SHINE A LIGHT
THE FALL
MONGOL
THE PROMOTION
OTHER STUFF
SCORSESE'S SHINE A LIGHT


The music of the Rolling Stones has lit up the soundtrack to so many Martin Scorsese films ("Gimme Shelter" has appeared in no less than three of his features--GOODFELLAS, CASINO, and THE DEPARTED) that it's little surprise to find the director teaming up with the legendary rockers for this... The music of the Rolling Stones has lit up the soundtrack to so many Martin Scorsese films ("Gimme Shelter" has appeared in no less than three of his features--GOODFELLAS, CASINO, and THE DEPARTED) that it's little surprise to find the director teaming up with the legendary rockers for this concert recording. SHINE A LIGHT begins with a few glimpses of the preparation that went into the recording of the show, which was staged over two nights at New York City's Beacon Theatre in 2006. Scorsese also includes some candid footage of the Stones doing a pre-show meet-and-greet with guests Bill and Hillary Clinton, which highlights some of the different personality traits in the band. Keith Richards and Ron Wood are the clowns, always goofing around; Mick Jagger is the consummate professional, always polite to a fault; Charlie Watts caries a real air of dignity, as befits someone who enjoys a dual career as a noted jazz musician. The bulk of the movie is dedicated to the multi-camera shoot at the Beacon, which captures the Stones playing some of their biggest hits and a few lesser-known numbers. Special guests such as Jack White, Buddy Guy, and Christina Aguilera are ushered on at various points in the show, and the concert footage is broken up by some amusing vintage footage of the band. By using so many cameras, Scorsese captures a side of the Stones that is rarely seen, such as Watts turning to camera and puffing out his cheeks and Richards offering encouraging words to Jack White as he exits the stage. SHINE A LIGHT provides a welcome glimpse into the Stones' world at this advanced stage in their career, and continues Scorsese's obsession (see also: NO DIRECTION HOME and THE LAST WALTZ) with documenting some of the most influential characters in rock & roll.

THE FALL--R


By Roger Ebert

Tarsem's "The Fall" is a mad folly, an extravagant visual orgy, a free-fall from reality into uncharted realms. Surely it is one of the wildest indulgences a director has ever granted himself. Tarsem, for two decades a leading director of music videos and TV commercials, spent millions of his own money to finance "The Fall," filmed it for four years in 28 countries and has made a movie that you might want to see for no other reason than because it exists. There will never be another like it.
"The Fall" is so audacious that when Variety calls it a "vanity project," you can only admire the man vain enough to make it. It tells a simple story with vast romantic images so stunning I had to check twice, three times, to be sure the film actually claims to have absolutely no computer-generated imagery. None? What about the Labyrinth of Despair, with no exit? The intersecting walls of zig-zagging staircases? The man who emerges from the burning tree? Perhaps the key words are "computer-generated." Perhaps some of the images are created by more traditional kinds of special effects.
The story framework for the imagery is straightforward. In Los Angeles, circa 1915, a silent movie stunt man has his legs paralyzed while performing a reckless stunt. He convalesces in a half-deserted hospital, its corridors of cream and lime stretching from ward to ward of mostly empty beds, their pillows and sheets awaiting the harvest of World War I. The stunt man is Roy (Lee Pace), pleasant in appearance, confiding in speech, happy to make a new friend of a little girl named Alexandria (Catinca Untaru).
Roy tells a story to Alexandria, involving adventurers who change appearance as quickly as a child's imagination can do its work. We see the process. He tells her of an "Indian" who has a wigwam and a squaw. She does not know these words, and envisions an Indian from a land of palaces, turbans and swamis. The verbal story is input from Roy; the visual story is output from Alexandria.
The story involves Roy (playing the Black Bandit) and his friends: a bomb-throwing Italian anarchist, an escaped African slave, an Indian (from India), and Charles Darwin and his pet monkey, Wallace. Their sworn enemy, Governor Odious, has stranded them on a desert island, but they come ashore (riding swimming elephants, of course) and wage war on him.
Roy draws out the story for a personal motive; after Alexandria brings him some communion wafers from the hospital chapel, he persuades her to steal some morphine tablets from the dispensary. Paralyzed and having lost his great love (she is the Princess in his story), he hopes to kill himself. There is a wonderful scene of the little girl trying to draw him back to life.
Either you are drawn into the world of this movie or you are not. It is preposterous, of course, but I vote with Werner Herzog, who says if we do not find new images, we will perish. Here a line of bowmen shoot hundreds of arrows into the air. So many of them fall into the back of the escaped slave that he falls backward and the weight of his body is supported by them, as on a bed of nails with dozens of foot-long arrows. There is scene of the monkey Wallace chasing a butterfly through impossible architecture.
At this point in reviews of movies like "The Fall" (not that there are any), I usually announce that I have accomplished my work. I have described what the movie does, how it looks while it is doing it, and what the director has achieved. Well, what has he achieved? "The Fall" is beautiful for its own sake. And there is the sweet charm of the young Romanian actress Catinca Untaru, who may have been dubbed for all I know, but speaks with the innocence of childhood, working her way through tangles of words. She regards with equal wonder the reality she lives in, and the fantasy she pretends to. It is her imagination that creates the images of Roy's story, and they have a purity and power beyond all calculation. Roy is her perfect storyteller, she is his perfect listener, and together they build a world.
Ebert notes: The movie's R rating should not dissuade bright teenagers from this celebration of the imagination.
MONGOL--R (subtitled)

Award-winning Russian filmmaker Sergei Bodrov (Prisoner of the Mountains) illuminates the life and legend of Genghis Khan in his stunning historical epic, Mongol. Based on leading scholarly accounts and written by Bodrov and Arif Aliyev, Mongol delves into the dramatic and harrowing... Award-winning Russian filmmaker Sergei Bodrov (Prisoner of the Mountains) illuminates the life and legend of Genghis Khan in his stunning historical epic, Mongol. Based on leading scholarly accounts and written by Bodrov and Arif Aliyev, Mongol delves into the dramatic and harrowing early years of the ruler who was born as Temudgin in 1162. As it follows Temudgin from his perilous childhood to the battle that sealed his destiny, the film paints a multidimensional portrait of the future conqueror, revealing him not as the evil brute of hoary stereotype, but as an inspiring, fearless and visionary leader. Mongol shows us the making of an extraordinary man, and the foundation on which so much of his greatness rested: his relationship with his wife, Borte, his lifelong love and most trusted advisor.

Filmed in the very lands that gave birth to Genghis Khan, Mongol transports us back to a distant and exotic period in world history; to a nomad's landscape of endless space, climatic extremes and ever-present danger. In a performance of powerful stillness and subtlety, celebrated young Japanese actor Asano Tadanobu (Zatoichi, Last Life in the Universe) captures the inner fire that enabled a hunted boy to become a legendary conqueror. Asano's achievement is matched by those of his co-stars, including the radiant newcomer Khulan Chuluun as Temudgin's courageous, spirited wife Borte, and the Chinese actor Honglei Sun (The Road Home) as the Mongol chieftain Jamukha, Temudgin's dearest friend and deadliest enemy. Masterfully blending action and emotion against some of the most arresting terrain on earth, Bodrov delivers an exciting and awe-inspiring tale of survival and triumph, and a love story for the ages. --© Picturehouse
THE PROMOTION--R


THE PROMOTION is a low-key, deader than deadpan comedy-drama that fans of THE OFFICE should love. The film stars Sean William Scott (AMERICAN PIE) and John C. Reilly (TALLADEGA NIGHTS) as assistant managers dueling for the same promotion within their Chicago-area grocery chain. Doug (Scott) is initially so sure the job is his that he takes all sorts of financial risks to impress his wife (Jenna Fischer); Richard (Reilly) is a transfer from Canada with an addiction to self-help tapes, plus a druggie biker past he needs to keep under wraps as the interview process heats up and the undercutting begins. Writer-director Steve Conrad continues exploring his fascination with how average Americans measure themselves and fight for their slice of the pie, a study he began in his acclaimed screenplays for THE PURSUIT OF HAPPYNESS and THE WEATHER MAN. As a director he's too caustic and straight-faced to be his generation's Frank Capra, but maybe that just reflects the more complex times. THE PROMOTION captures an America in regression, a land where once-certain futures are suddenly up for grabs, and the film's cagey shifts from improv-style comedy to personal drama keep one guessing all the way to the finish line. Sporting a fetching Scots accent as Richard's better half, the diminutive Lili Taylor (I SHOT ANDY WARHOL, THE ADDICTION) steals what scenes she can. The usually extroverted Scott gets props for playing his emotional cards close to the vest this time, but can't match Reilly for hangdog goofball timing.


OTHER STUFF: DECADES
There is something visceral about seeing the Whiteside trying to shake from her slumber. Almost every night I look at the front of the old gal as an exercise in trying not to get too nostalgic. It's so easy to wander down the path of memories ripe with times when I was crawling through the walls, and all the other sentences that begin with "There was the time. . . ."

We all miss the days when the Whiteside did more than divide the town between those who long for the building to be what she once was and those who may feel the same, but suspect that, if resurrected, the Whiteside will inhale more than it exhales. I tumble and crash through my mind, searching for the possibility of everyone getting what they want.

I know that as a for-profit business, she will not stay awake very long. I know nothing about non-profits, so in my ignorance lies some hope.

To review: the Whiteside was donated by Regal to the non-profit group, The Friends of the Whiteside. If I understand correctly, one of the conditions of the donation is that they cannot play first run movies for the first 90 days after release. It says nothing about the Whiteside being restricted from playing Darkside-type movies whenever they want. Thanks for that, Regal.

As she sits now, the Whiteside is a bleak hole on the corner of 4th and Madison. I was hoping the proposed retail development of the Whiteside building would at least turn the building into something that was breathing. My secret hope was that a deal could be struck so that there would be no structural changes to the building for the retail remodel. This would mean if a non-profit ever got their hands on it in the future (However that might happen, no one knows.), they might have gotten an improved Whiteside. This means the restoration would start with putting the pretty pieces back into place rather than having to start with rebuilding the infrastructure.

For those who love segues that have nothing to do with continuity, prepare for ecstasy.

Not so long ago it was my mom's birthday. Since we also remember the date of her death, that gives a pretty broad hint that she would not be attending any birthday parties. Nevertheless, it was her birthday, so my brother and I, without speaking a word about Mom, agreed to go for a motorcycle ride on that day. As we twisted our way down Peoria Road, I found it to be a beautiful, refreshing day. My brother, however, did not have a windshield. It is rare for my brother and I to ride together and not have it turn into some form of contest. The decades have changed nothing. Very soon he was passing me, crouched down on his tank, his wrist twisted rather gaily, finding full throttle. Frankly, I wasn't in the mood-even though my bike's engine is three times the size of his. [Ed: Spoken like a true Older Brother.] So I let him zoom ahead, and watched his crouching figure grow smaller ahead of me. He and I have gotten our share of tickets engaging in speed contests with each other. Since that was decades ago and my insurance is as cheap as it gets, I was in no hurry to catch up with him. After about 50 miles we pulled over for something to drink and for him to give his own damn self a rest from the buzzing.

We talked of work and the economy and our wives and motorcycles and what we will do when we grow up. Though we are both scaring the hell out of 50 years-old, our conversation led us back in time to when we were a couple of crazy idiots busting down Oregon back roads at double the speed limit with no helmets and often a beer or two under our belts. It was a time when our mom was still alive, no thanks to us. We would conclude our ride at the parents' house and she would make us something to eat and listen to our watered down/less daring versions of stories with that who-do-you-think-you're-bullshitting look moms are issued with their first child. She wouldn't comment on the stupidity we had just engaged in or the tickets she knew were burning a hole into our wallets. She knew.

On this recent day, I drank my water and my brother drank his Pepsi and we filled the air between us with anything but talk of Mom. We knew we both were thinking of her while riding on that asphalt strip between hay fields. It's why we were out here on this particular day.

When we hit town my brother peeled off to his home with a honk and a thumbs up. I rumbled to work.

The shadows were getting long on Madison as I moved down the street toward the front of the Darkside. The Whiteside loomed to my right. I realize that no matter what happens to the Whiteside, or even the Darkside, it's not going to stop the world from turning-just like my mom's death: the sun came up again, the very day after she passed. By not taking on the emotional weight of the Whiteside, I find I'm a lot more pragmatic about it. I've learned not to trust nostalgia. When I visit my old high school, I feel a glistening wistfulness. Then I remember that high school was one of the worst times of my life, and I have to question feeling anything but rage about soul crushing curricula, acne, and going without wheels. When I disconnect from how I'm "supposed to" feel about school-good or bad-I find myself in a moment of clarity where I remember that nostalgia has nothing to do with reality.

But whether it's my mom or the Whiteside, I do feel a sense of loss. Yes, the Whiteside might be brought back as a theater, but it will never be the old building with musty nooks and crannies left the same since the '30s. History lay in drawings just behind shelving or in the carvings on the walls of the claustrophobic, sure-to-be-replaced restroom stalls. The old tube amp racks were taken from the wall of the projection booth to make room for the solid-state processors that replaced them. The masses will only see it as a grand venue with a balcony and velvet curtains. Even as a restored grand venue, I will miss the old gal, because old buildings have a different hum than old buildings made into new ones.

Everything falls into cinematic context. It is a gift of intimacy to disturb the dust that gathered before Luke Skywalker filled the screen with his mighty and impressive light saber. When I picked up a box of carbon rod ends, I can believe they are the stubs of the carbons used to strike the arc that sent the flickering image of GONE WITH THE WIND over the heads of the audience. Hiding in a corner behind the stage is a rusty artifact that once was a curtain motor. Surely it parted the drapes for AN AMERICAN IN PARIS and ON THE WATERFRONT. Finding a gold coin holds no more allure for me than finding a ticket stub from the opening night of ET: The Extra-Terrestrial.

I am grateful for having had the old Whiteside in my life and for my mom who knew me as I am. My mom would have understood why a piece of sound head door glass with the peeling RCA label was something I got excited about. She understood my treasures. She would understand what it is I will miss about the Whiteside, even if it is faithfully restored.



As always, thanks for your continued support!

Remember what happened to the Whiteside.

Darkside Cinema
215 SW 4th
Corvallis, OR 97333
Darkside Cinema website
541·752·4161
 

Note: Noah Stroup, author of the Alchemist  weekly column normally appearing her., is in Chicago for Lollapalooza, and we are running a blog from Cybthia, of Midway Farms, at 6980 Highway 20 NW, this week.
MIDWAY FARMS
How did you get that scratch on your forehead Cynthia?
Last night one of our young gray heritage breed turkeys decide to fly up to our window. I walked over to talk with her wondering why she was there. She was one we had raised from a chick. She saw me, then quick as anything flew in and landed on my head. Apparently she lost the other turkeys & felt she needed somewhere safe to be. Perched on moms head! Of course. I must admit it did startle me a bit.
Our farm stand is very much like a neighbourhood farmers market. We have a lot of families involved in the growing & making of goodies for the stand. We want people to be involve with the farm, feel what it's like to be on the farm. See the chickens, touch the cow. Be part of it all. I don't want to be a booth on concrete. Maybe if you have some time to drop in to see what this crazy farmer is trying to pull off it would be great. Let me know if your ever going out this way.
I'm not online much because of all the work around here. The cow gets upset if I'm not on time for milking. This evening I was deep in though while milking Heidi our family milk cow, When POW! it hit me.... her tail that is. -Cynthia