Happy International Women's Day! I just found a website that has a global register of IWD events. So go find what's happening where you are.

A friend in Italy says on his blog that the holiday is a much bigger deal in Europe than in the U.S.

Can someone please explain why people are wasting time and money trying to impeach Bush? For one thing, it's not going to happen, but even more importantly, do you really want Dick Cheney to be president?

We'd have to impeach like 8 people before we'd get to someone in the chain of command that's not just as dangerous to the world as Bush. At least Bush is an incompetent monkey that's making a fool out of himself and the whole regime. Impeaching him would be like getting rid of Jar Jar Binks so that Darth Vader can take over.

Is it just symbolic? Pshaw. I'm tired of (at least that kind of) symbolism. I bet you'd have more positive effect on the world if you took the money that these people are spending on impeachment ads in the New York Times and spent it buying satellite internet modems for villages in Iran.

I have to admit, I've always been a sucker for vampire films. Not all of them. I go for the "cool" vampire films. Call it a guilty pleasure, but I love stories of immortal superhuman nightdwellers that take place in the modern world surrounded by pop cultural allusions. From Lost Boys to Queen of the Damned, even Blade, they may not be that good as cinema, really, but for some reason I go see them and usually enjoy them.

So, take that as an extended caveat. Maybe you shouldn't trust me to endorse the film I just saw today, Night Watch ("Nochnoi Dozor" in Russian), but I thought it was pretty great. It had incredible Matrix-inspired effects and a gripping "mythology" involving an age-old truce between good and evil "Others," who are basically superhumans with a variety of powers - seers (like the main character), witches, were-tigers, healers, and, yup, vampires. Plus, it all takes place on a backdrop of seedy Moscow nightlife, with goths and gangsters and bureaucratic officers of the Night Watch, which enforces the truce, driving around in big yellow rocket-powered firetruck-like vehicles. (I know, sounds silly, but I warned ya)

Seeing this film was my test, speaking of trust, as to whether I should give cred to the reviews of Tucson Weekly movie critic James Digiovanna, who basically panned the film. Now I know not to listen to his conclusions, though I can say he included enough factual description of the film in his review for me to think that it sounded interesting. One thing I hate is reviewers who only give their opinion and don't back it up with any facts about the film.

One of the things that Digiovanna got right was that the film has one very amazing innovation: the subtitles. It's really incredible how they've worked the typography and animation of the subtitles to fit with what's going on in the scene. For instance whenever the evil vampiress is calling her prey to come to her the subtitles look like floating, bloody smoke. Or when the good nerdy hacker is searching cyberspace for information and telling his boss what he finds, his subtitles have a cursor and they scroll like text on a computer. This could get hokey but it's not overdone; it's very artful. I wonder if this will inspire a trend.

One might just write this film off as good meaningless fun with great effects but not much else, but I actually think the plot is a subtle allusion to current geopolitics. The film depicts a classic, epic battle between sides that are literally called the Dark and the Light, and yet there's still moral ambiguity; there's the idea that the side that is supposed to be good is doing some pretty shitty stuff that makes them not that different than the baddies. I won't give away any more than that.

Anyway, I look forward to the second installment in this trilogy. It's called "Day Watch." Maybe it'll suck compared to the first one, but I'll give it a chance.

Epic is the "hip" place to hang and take an espresso in Tucson. It's often too hip for me, but sometimes I go. And the demographics are actually more varied than the "hipster" moniker implies. It's a really popular place with lots of people, but the vibe is definitely leaning toward the overly-cool idle class. If I went there regularly I could probably make a whole blog just about the strange things I overhear there.

Today was one of the exceptions to the demographic but a great example of the surreal conversations I accidentally eavesdrop on all the time. I'm sitting there now and as I walked in I overheard the following: "...sounds like you need to have a rottweiler loose on the property." I look over and it's a grizzled old guy in overalls talking on a cellphone and smoking a cigar. He's wearing a black baseball cap that says "Get The Fuck Away From Me."

Um, Okay.

Well, Rod just called and he's on his way back from San Diego after attending a hearing on the government's motion to stay his release. The judge said no, why don't you prepare something more carefully.

so The govt is going to refile their motion and a hearing is set for 2 weeks from now, march 23, when he has to go back to San Diego again.

We got reporters from all over calling and emailing us to hear the news. It's pretty crazy.

okay. gotta go. other things call...

I went on an "adventure" to a "secret" part of southern arizona this weekend. I camped with a friend in a high desert valley, 2 miles from the Mexican border. Last night we got settled in and then saw lights and we knew it was the Border Patrol. We were all ready to be harassed by La Migra, though we knew we were doing nothing wrong that we knew of. We were on National Forest land, so it was fine to camp where we were. But there are countless anecdotes of Border Patrol agents giving shit to people, or at least bothering them with warnings of how dangerous it is so close to the border, that there are dangerous smugglers around, etc.

Anyway, we waited patiently for the truck to get to us. When it did it paused, lights blaring, then courteously pulled forward so the lights were no longer shining right at us. It was indeed border patrol. Then the driver said "how y'all doing?" we said hi and then he said "do y'all know which Forest Service road this is?" We didn't know, but offered to show him a map. He said no, that's okay, there's probably a sign around here somewhere.

He drove off and we laughed. A lost border patrol agent. hilarious.

The altitude was higher than we'd planned and so it was extremely cold. Probably in the 20s. So it was one of the least comfortable nights I can remember. It was not only really cold but my friend thrashed around in her sleep and pushed me off my sleeping pad halfway through the night. I got very little sleep. Finally dawn came and I watched Venus rise and then the sun rise, then I dozed a bit, woke up and couldnt sleep any more, though it was only about 7. We made oatmeal and tea and packed up and drove back to Tucson, stopping in Patagonia for coffee and bagels at the little cafe there.

I'd been asked to help drive Rod Coronado to San Diego for his appearance in federal court there tommorrow morning. I was willing to do it, but wasn't looking forward to it after getting so little sleep on the campout, but luckily when we got back Rod called and said he'd found others to go. whew. Driving all night from Tucson to San Diego on about 3 hours of sleep would not have been fun.

Plus, the other good thing is that now I can go see Awesome Ocealot tonight, a friend's band that I've been wanting to see. yay. i better go now, actually, before i fall asleep. heh.

Someone translated part of my film into German.

Hmm. Well, I guess if they do the whole thing and I have time, I'll put German subtitles on the DVD too. Except that would be a lot of extra work. Hmm.

I just listened to a radio program with John Perkins, the author of the hit book "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man." Also on the show were 3 other guests with a wide range of positions about the claims Perkins makes in his book. The most last one is a guy from the World Bank who basically completely disagrees. His main point was, well, yeah, there's bad stories but there's good ones too, and of course projects and loans are going to fail a lot because these countries are risky environments. He also spewed out lots of statistics about how the world and its poor people are better off in the last few decades thanks to foreign aid and the IMF and the World Bank, etc. Perkins counters with other statistics that prove just the opposite.

The show's host sums it up by saying "the devil is in the details." Whenever anyone uses that maxim I like to quote Einstein who said the opposite: God is in the details.

But anyway, my point is, if the details are important, but the different sides are tossing around totally contradictory details, how do we decide? What numbers do we believe? How can we, the normal, everyday members of civil society, possibly know what the truth is? on one side are very smart people, even nice people, even a couple people I know personally, who say "capitalism has made the world better, here's the stats to prove it." And then on the other side are other very smart people saying the opposite, and they have convincing figures too.

What to believe? Is this just a matter of faith?

I made a new version of the trailer for my Juarez doc. It's basically the same as the old one, I just took out all the people titles, so viewers don't have to try to read them in such a short time, and changed the end title so it's not time-specific (it used to say "coming soon in fall 2005." hah..) A couple other little visual things are spruced up too.

I haven't had time to read it, but here's what looks like a really good report called Invisible Hands. Tracing the Connections Between the Policies of International Financial Institutions and Country Budget Policies (a PDF file). Written by Jim Schultz of the Democracy Center. It's the result of a conference where people trying to make budget processes more transparent in their countries met up with people who are working to make financial organizations like the World Bank more accountable. I've skimmed it, looks great, don't have time to read it. If you do, let me know what you think. [embarrassed shrug]