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06/01/06
Val Zavala>> Tonight on Life and Times --
What are the key differences between the Democrats who want to be governor? We'll let them tell you.
Phil Angelides>> I'm tired of this Bush-Schwarzenegger agenda that I think is hurting working people and hurting our school kids.
Steve Westly>> My opponent is running on a platform of raising five to ten billion dollars of new taxes, taxes on the wealthy, the middle-class, taxes on real estate, services, sales tax. I think that's wrong.
Val Zavala>> And then, romantic comedy, urban acrobatics and a strong message on the environment. What's new and what's hot at the box office?
It's all coming up next on tonight's Life and Times.
Announcer>> Life and Times is made possible through the generous support of the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of medicine, health, science and education.
And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg.
Val Zavala>> Will more libraries help make our kids smarter or solve our illiteracy problem? Well, that's a decision that you, the voter, will have to make come Tuesday. On the ballot, you'll see a bond measure, six hundred million dollars to build and renovate libraries. Is it worth it? To help you decide, Anne McDermott took a look at Proposition 81.
Anne McDermott>> The Duarte Public Library. It's a favorite hangout for lots of folks in the neighborhood like seven year old Abigail Alvarez. Do you enjoy reading?
Abigail Alvarez>> Yes.
Anne McDermott>> Can you describe why?
Abigail Alvarez>> Because I like the books.
Anne McDermott>> Do you have any idea what you want to do when you get older? When you grow up?
Abigail Alvarez>> To be?
Anne McDermott>> Um-hum.
Abigail Alvarez>> A teacher.
Anne McDermott>> And when she teaches, she says she'll instill in her students a love of libraries like this one. But Abigail doesn't notice the cracks in the cinder blocks or the wear and tear on the walls and the floors and the ceiling. Library manager, Pui-Ching Ho does and she's well aware that the building has seen better days.
Pui-Ching Ho>> It was built in the 1960s, so it's over forty years old. There are some roof leaks in a public area and also in the workroom.
Anne McDermott>> But help may be on the way. Next week's ballot includes Proposition 81 which would give the state the go-ahead to sell six hundred million dollars in bonds to fund grants for construction and renovation of local libraries.
Although that sounds like a lot of money, it's a drop in the bucket compared to the estimated four billion dollars needed to upgrade libraries statewide. And the critics of the bond measure point out that, after thirty years of interest payments, the real cost of the six hundred million dollar bond will be $1.2 billion.
And how many of Los Angeles County's eighty-four libraries would actually benefit? Only a handful. And libraries could only use the state funds if local sources kick in about a third of the costs. Is this a wise investment? The question was put to Fontayne Holmes, the head of the Central Library in downtown Los Angeles. Do people still use libraries?
Fontayne Holmes>> Well, in my thirty-one years, I can tell you that they use libraries today more than ever before and the Los Angeles Public Library is very, very, very popular. We had more than fourteen million visitors last year to the Central Library and our seventy-one branches.
Anne McDermott>> So it's agreed then? Libraries are good? They need money, so Proposition 81 is a good thing? Not so fast, says this tax activist. He is Mark Spence, one of the founders of protecttaxpayers.com. To Spence, Proposition 81 is nothing but years of economic trouble. You're not against libraries, are you?
Mark Spence>> Of course, I'm not against libraries. I use libraries. I'm a lifetime member of my local library friends group. I served on the California State Library Board. Libraries are important to our communities, but Proposition 81 is a fiscally irresponsible way to fund what we need in libraries.
Anne McDermott>> Proposition 81, according to Spence, is like piling up credit card debt and the state already has about eighty billion dollars worth of that. He notes that the last bond sale to benefit libraries back in 2000 ran out of funds before it could complete many of the projects it had hoped to provide for. Spence says, yes, go ahead and fund libraries, but fund them without going into debt. One idea is to improve libraries with money that's now going to what Spence says are less deserving state efforts.
Mark Spence>> You know, we have a commission that deals with avocados. We can abolish that and that will free up a million dollars right then that could be used to help out libraries. I mean, there's lots of commissions and lots of over-spending in those categories that could be used and that doesn't get into other trickier issues like benefits for people here illegally and all those other things.
Anne McDermott>> Now you may be wondering, "Haven't I seen a lot of beautiful new libraries opening lately?" Yes, you have, but those are Los Angeles city libraries. The city of Los Angeles has spent more than three hundred million to modernize or build sixty-three branches. The libraries in Los Angeles County have been neglected and need state support -- or do they?
Some critics argue that libraries should be paid for locally, that the state has other pressing needs. Schools, roads, water projects that should take priority. Still, there is little organized opposition to Proposition 81. It was proposed two years ago by a San Diego State Senator named Dede Alpert. Governor Schwarzenegger said he'd support it if Alpert would wait two years to put it on the ballot, and she did.
Now that may have been a blessing in disguise because now it's the only bond measure on this Tuesday's ballot, an advantage that backers hope will increase its chance of passing. They also point out that libraries are getting higher and higher tech all the time and are helping to close the computer gap.
Fontayne Holmes>> Our computers are used all the time. I mean, every day, every hour. It's absolutely incredible. And just this year, we have gone wireless at most of our libraries. By the end of the year, it will be all of them. Right now, Central Library and fifty-seven branches are Wi-Fi. So now when you come into our libraries, not only do you see every computer -- and, of course, people reading also at the reading tables -- but now people are coming in with their laptops.
Anne McDermott>> Proposition 81 is the third state library bond since 1988. Isn't that enough, you ask? Well, previous library bonds were smaller and the six hundred million dollars for libraries is dwarfed by a thirty-seven billion dollar infrastructure bond. That's coming up on November's ballot.
Proposition 81 needs just a simple majority to pass. Its backers include teachers, organized labor, businesses, major newspapers and library patrons like civil engineer, Tesse Roberts. How long have you been going to the library?
Tesse Roberts>> Since I was in my mother's womb (laughter). My mother is a librarian actually. She got her Masters of Library Science while she was pregnant with me, so I was almost born in the library.
Fontayne Holmes>> Anyone just can walk into any one of our libraries. Any day of the week in the afternoon, in the morning, in the evening, you will see a cross-section of the city of Los Angeles.
Tesse Roberts>> Libraries are what allows everyone, regardless of age or income or race or your situation in life, to have an equal chance at learning.
Fontayne Holmes>> From the babies and the toddlers, to the senior citizens, families coming together. You see the face of Los Angeles. It's just all ethnicities, all economic classes. It's the real coming together place in this city.
Anne McDermott>> It is for Abigail Alvarez who comes together as often as she can with all her favorite authors. I'm Anne McDermott for Life and Times.
Announcer>> Kcet.org is the place to look for the very latest on Life and Times. You'll find previews of upcoming stories, plus transcripts and audio of past episodes and links to some of our most interesting features. Just go to kcet.org, scroll down the page and click on "Life and Times".
Val Zavala>> The campaign for Democratic candidate for governor has been a bitter one. Steve Westly and Phil Angelides are running neck and neck and both candidates want to win the right to challenge Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in the fall. But can they pull it off after such a negative campaign? Hena Cuevas talked with both candidates to try to get to the issues.
Hena Cuevas>> The two candidates vying for the Democratic ticket are State Treasurer, Phil Angelides, who visited our KCET studios, and State Controller, Steve Westly, who we met at a campaign stop at a senior citizen center in Reseda. One thing they both agree on is that Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger does not deserve a second term.
Phil Angelides>> Well, the fact is, he's failed at the job. He said he'd balance the budget and he borrowed billions. He said he'd protect education and then he became the first governor in my lifetime to turn thousands of young people away from college. At each and every turn, he has turned his back on hard-working people, students, college kids, and he hasn't lived up to his promise. He hasn't moved our state forward.
Steve Westly>> Governor Schwarzenegger came in with great promise. He promised to fully fund public education, but he broke that promise. He then said he was going to work across party lines and be a bipartisan governor and then he spent the whole last year attacking nurses, teachers, firefighters with this special election that no one really wanted. I think we need a governor who can bring people together, who can paint a positive picture for the future and who truly understands how to run a large state like California.
Hena Cuevas>> Next Tuesday, June 6, Democrats across the state will select who will challenge Schwarzenegger for the governorship. Both candidates have their own website, angelides.com and westly2006.com. But in their never-ending attempts to reach voters, both are entering new territory including profiles on the popular teen website, My Space. Angelides was first.
Phil Angelides>> It was completely organic in the sense that a young campaign volunteer set it up. You know, I'm like most fifty-two year olds. I have no idea what My Space is.
Hena Cuevas>> How that effort will translate into votes will be determined next Tuesday. Still, a recent Los Angeles Times poll gives a slight advantage to former school teacher Westly, although real estate developer Angelides follows close behind. On paper, you and your opponent look very, very similar. You're both Democrats, you have very similar supporters. What makes you different?
Steve Westly>> Well, again, I think we're both progressive on social issues and I want to give my opponent credit there. The difference is, on fiscal issues, my opponent is running on a ten billion dollar tax increase on the middle-class and other Californians. I think that's wrong. I've put forward another plan. I haven't just talked about it, but I've done it. I've brought in $4.8 billion dollars without raising a nickel on taxes.
There are other issues as well. On the environment, I have a twenty-five year track record of standing up for the environment. I worked for President Jimmy Carter at the Department of Energy. I worked on conservation and solar. My opponent, in contrast, has been a real estate developer. I think there's a real difference there between a career environmentalist and a real estate developer. I think this is a green state. People want someone truly committed to the environment.
What helps me is that I've got a real track record of working in the real world, running a business, being an entrepreneur. You know, seventy percent of Californians work for small business. I can speak to those issues. I'm running a campaign based on job growth and preparing this state for the future. That's what Californians want in their governor.
Phil Angelides>> Whoever is governor next year will face a four billion dollar budget deficit which means, unless we roll back some of these tax breaks for the wealthy and corporations, schools will get cut again and college tuition fees will go up. Which is why I'm saying that, before we cut schools, before we raise college fees and tuitions, before we freeze help for the aged, blind and disabled, how about asking those of us who've done the best to chip back in?
By the way, it's what Pat Brown did. It's what Ronald Reagan even did. You know, income taxes for people making over half a million dollars or more a year are lower today than they were when Ronald Reagan was governor, so I'm just talking about some fairness here.
Steve Westly and Arnold Schwarzenegger will face that same budget gap, but they've got no plan. I'm just saying that I'm tired of George Bush's America. I'm tired of this Bush-Schwarzenegger agenda that I think is hurting working people and hurting our school kids.
Steve Westly>> My opponent is running on a platform of raising five to ten billion dollars of new taxes, taxes on the wealthy, the middle-class, taxes on real estate, services, sales tax. I think that's wrong. That's why I've stood up and said, look, let me talk about accountability first. We need to make sure that corporations and others are already paying the taxes they owe.
I helped to successfully bring in over $4.8 billion dollars of taxes that no one thought was possible. I don't just talk about this. I've done it. And I think that's what most Californians are looking for. Someone who will bring new ideas to government, who can find ways to bring money into government without having massive tax increases.
Hena Cuevas>> Is taxing the wealthy the only solution for California?
Phil Angelides>> No. It's just a piece of what we need to do. You know, we need to make government more efficient. In my Treasurer's office, I don't just talk the talk. I walk the walk. I have nine percent fewer employees than when I took over from my Republican predecessor. My own budget is smaller.
You know, Governor Schwarzenegger said he'd root out waste, fraud and abuse, but he hasn't. Steve Westly says he'll make government more efficient, but in 2003 during our worst budget crisis, he headed only one of three agencies that couldn't meet their budget targets. So I'm going to make government more efficient. I'm going to work to collect uncollected taxes.
But in the end, I'm not going to cut our schools, I'm not going to raise tuition fees, I'm not going to heap more burdens on working people and poor people. Before there's more sacrifice by the people who can least afford it, I'm going to ask the big boys to chip in.
Hena Cuevas>> When did you realize that somebody like Schwarzenegger who seemed so invincible -- what made you think, "Hey, I can take this guy"?
Steve Westly>> You know, I think literally four or five months after he was elected, we began to see that a lot of the Hollywood special effects might not just be real. It's really when he stood up and broke his public promise to fund public education. This is the most important thing in the world to me. I have a four and a half year old and a six year old going to public school. I see the challenges of education through the eyes of a parent.
We're going to have to do better in this generation because our kids aren't just competing against the smartest kids from Nevada or Arizona. They're competing with the brightest kids of China, Korea and India. We need a governor who can prepare our children to be successful. I believe I can do that.
Phil Angelides>> I was taught to stand up for what you believe in and to fight and I decided to take this on even when he was riding sky-high and, I'll tell you something, I still believe I'm the underdog because he's a global action hero.
But I know what's right and that's that California needs a governor who will really give people a chance to climb the ladder of opportunity, who'll stand up even if it means taking on the big corporations like Exxon-Mobil, the wealthiest Californians and saying, you know what, no more tax breaks for you. Let's help our kids.
Steve Westly>> But I think what people really want is not another career Sacramento insider, someone with all the support from the political establishment. I think they want someone who's been supported by Democratic groups as I have. They want someone who's going to fix things, not be a partisan or an ideologue. I'm here to break the logjam in Sacramento. That's what the state needs.
Phil Angelides>> You know, I've done well in life, but I'm smart enough to know that I didn't just do well because I was the smartest guy or I worked the hardest. I got a lot of breaks, parents who cared, good schools, and a lot of people don't get those breaks. I want to be a governor who recognizes that there's a lot of people who need a chance. They just need one break in their life to do better.
Steve Westly>> I think Californians want a new governor and I think Democrats are looking for someone who can beat Arnold Schwarzenegger and the data shows that I'm the one Democrat who can.
Phil Angelides>> I intend to win this. I believe I'll win this. I have tens of thousands of volunteers around the state right now who are walking door to door and phoning. I have the power of belief. But I've learned in my life -- and I tell this to my three daughters -- you don't need a title to make a difference.
Hena Cuevas>> But before either man can square off with Schwarzenegger come November 7, they must first win the support of the primary voters. I'm Hena Cuevas for Life and Times.
Announcer>> To send a comment or a question to our program, you can reach us by mail at this address:
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Larry Mantle>> Welcome to FilmWeek on Life and Times. I'm Larry Mantle of 89.3 KPCC. First up this week is "The Break-Up" starring Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn from a story co-written by Vaughn.
[Film Clip]
Larry Mantle>> I'm joined this week by critics Jean Oppenheimer of New Times and Andy Klein of City Beat and Valley Beat where he is film editor. Andy, fill us in on "The Break-Up".
Andy Klein>> This film is not what I expected it to be. It's got a great hook for a romantic comedy which is that Vince Vaughn and Jennifer Aniston play a mismatched couple who have a big fight and break up, but neither of them can really afford to move out of the apartment. They have this very high-priced condo and they can only afford to do it together, so they're forced to be living together while in the process of breaking up.
It's being sold as a romantic comedy and, in fact, it's not that funny. It's kind of an ugly movie in a lot of ways and I say that almost as if it's positive. It's much more realistic than I expected, but I think people are going to be stunned. I mean, I really thought they broke convention to such an extreme that I was in shock by the end.
Larry Mantle>> What did you think, Jean?
Jean Oppenheimer>> Well, like Andy, it was not what I expected, but I expected it to be good (laughter). I really don't think it was because I don't think you care about either of the characters. The Vince Vaughn character is this selfish jerk and, although her complaints about him are fully justified, you cannot understand why she'd want to stay with him or her ridiculous ways of thinking she can win him back by making him jealous.
I think, in the end, that the film is probably about that we grow from exceeding painful experiences. You know, by the time you get around to that, I just didn't care.
Larry Mantle>> Next up is the documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth". Davis Guggenheim directs the film that features former vice president and presidential candidate, Al Gore, as he warns of global warming and its future consequences.
[Film Clip]
Larry Mantle>> Jean, what did you think of the documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth"?
Jean Oppenheimer>> Well, I think it's a really interesting, very informative and very unexpectedly entertaining documentary that looks at global warming and, even more specifically, at Al Gore's attempt to increase public awareness and concern about the issue.
The film sort of revolves around a multi-media presentation that Gore wrote, produced and has been taking around the world. He really makes the scientific facts very easy to understand. I mean, global warming is a very complicated issue, but I could understand what he was talking about. I think that's obviously a big advantage.
It doesn't matter whether you are a Republican or a Democrat. It doesn't matter whether you support the administration in Washington or you don't. I don't think it even matters if you recognize or accept that there is a global warming or ecological crisis or whether you feel it's overblown. I think this has enough really important facts that it should be seen.
Larry Mantle>> Andy, what did you think?
Andy Klein>> Yeah, I agree. And there's also the fact that Al Gore is delivering this thing. I mean, it's like the antidote to everything that was his image in 2000. I mean, he's funny, he's relaxed, he's absolutely likable. He talks about his family. There are cutaways from the lecture to him on the road in voice-over talking about going on tour with this thing and about things from his upbringing. He's really a good performer here.
They mix up the charts and the facts with things. There are some cartoons, one of which was obviously done by Matt Groening's people because it looks exactly like "The Simpsons". The whole thing is way more entertaining than you would have any reason to expect from a lecturer about global warming.
Larry Mantle>> And finally this week, the French action film, "District B13" co-written by French director and writer, Luc Besson, and directed by Pierre Morel.
[Film Clip]
Larry Mantle>> So, Andy, what did you think of "District B13"?
Andy Klein>> I loved this movie. This is really a Hong Kong action movie except with French people. The plot is not very special. It's serviceable. It's the near future and bad neighborhoods in Paris are walled off to protect the nice people on the outside.
A crime lord in one of these neighborhoods gets his hands on some sort of super bomb. He doesn't realize that it's been set to explode in twenty-four hours, so a cop has to go in there to get the bomb back to diffuse it and he needs a guide to this neighborhood. So he breaks a guy out of prison who's actually a better hero than he is who grew up in that neighborhood and knows it well. They go in there together with this uneasy friendship.
That sounds like a million other movies, but what's great is that these action sequences reminded me of Jackie Chan movies. These guys obviously venerate Jackie Chan. It's like funny, fast and just wonderful action stuff.
Larry Mantle>> What did you think, Jean, of the film?
Jean Oppenheimer>> Well, if I had known going in that the actors -- or the people who were playing the parts. You can hardly call them actors -- were actually doing what we see, I think I would have appreciated it a whole lot more than I did. I thought it was just cinematic slight of hand special effects.
I'm not sure I would have liked it any more than I did, however, because these are stunt men who have not yet mastered the art of acting or even made a dent in it. I sort of like to go with a little bit more, you know, where I can relate to the characters.
It was not my cup of tea, but I can certainly understand why people who are really into that genre would like the film. It's not like "House of Flying Daggers" and all those films which I absolutely love. Those are much more sort of romantic action --
Larry Mantle>> -- very lush.
Jean Oppenheimer>> Yeah, very lush. This isn't that.
Larry Mantle>> Well, thanks for being with us for another FilmWeek on Life and Times. I'm Larry Mantle of 89.3 KPCC joined by critics Andy Klein of City Beat and Valley Beat, and Jean Oppenheimer of New Times. Please join us again next week at this same time for the next FilmWeek on Life and Times.
Val Zavala>> KPCC radio broadcasts a full hour of FilmWeek on Friday mornings at eleven. I'm Val Zavala. For everyone at Life and Times, thanks for watching. We'll see you next time.
Announcer>> Life and Times was made possible through the generous support of the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of medicine, health, science and education.
And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg.
Sponsored in part by:
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