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Life & Times Transcript

10/19/06

Val Zavala>> Tonight on Life and Times --

Will it raise the price of gas or reduce our dependence on foreign oil? The pros and cons of Proposition 87.

Yusef Robb>> The oil companies have us over a barrel. We're addicted to the oil they sell. That dependence puts money in their pockets.

Scott MacDonald>> It's not about oil companies. No one gets to vote yes or no on oil companies. No one gets to vote yes or no on campaign spending. We have to vote yes or no on Proposition 87.

Val Zavala>> And then, the image inspired the nation during World War II. Now a new film looks at the story behind the flag-raising at Iwo Jima.

It's all straight ahead 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>> We all know that politics is a magnet for money, but there is one measure on this November's ballot that is breaking all previous records. It is Proposition 87, the oil tax that would fund alternative fuels. Oil companies are spending tens of millions of dollars to defeat it and proponents are doing the same. Combined? Over a hundred million dollars so far. Toni Guinyard takes a look at both sides of Proposition 87.

Toni Guinyard>> The Clean Alternative Energy Initiative, Proposition 87, is all about oil. Voters must decide if oil producers should have to pay an extraction tax on every barrel of oil pumped from California, and the money collected, four billion dollars by the year 2017, would be used to fund production and research of alternative energy technology.

Maya Hyams>> I know everything that you do for progress is going to cost some money and I think we just have to bite the bullet and make this a better world for our children.

Bob Stern>> This is another proposition where California is trying to be sort of at the head of the rest of the country.

Toni Guinyard>> Bob Stern is President of the nonpartisan, nonprofit Center for Government Studies.

Bob Stern>> California is the only state that doesn't have a major tax on taking the oil out of the ground. All other states have that. Now California taxes the oil companies, though, in other ways, income tax, property tax and other taxes. Well, the oil companies are saying this is unfair. You're adding a tax upon a tax.

Toni Guinyard>> We asked him to analyze Proposition 87, the initiative aimed at decreasing the state oil consumption twenty-five percent in ten years. It also calls for the formation of an authority to oversee how the money would be spent.

Bob Stern>> Clearly, when you're talking about four billion dollars of money, you need to have oversight. You need to have somebody looking at that to make sure that the money is wisely spent, so that means a bureaucracy.

Toni Guinyard>> There are arguments for --

Yusef Robb>> It is designed to reduce California's dependence on oil over the next ten years and we don't want that money to go into the general fund where the legislature and the governor can do whatever the heck they want to with it.

Toni Guinyard>> -- and arguments against the initiative.

Scott MacDonald>> A four billion dollar oil tax is going to lead to more dependence on foreign oil and that is more expensive to get here, more expensive to refine and that means that we pay for more money at the pumps.

Toni Guinyard>> And that's become the centerpiece of the No On 87 campaign.

Narrator>> "If 87 passes, expect higher prices at the gas pumps."

Narrator>> "What are the chances a four billion dollar oil tax won't impact the price of gas?"

Toni Guinyard>> The initiative specifically prohibits oil companies from passing on the cost of the tax to consumers by raising the price of oil, gas or diesel, but enforcing it could be tough.

Bob Stern>> If costs go up for oil companies, they will pass on the costs. I think what will happen is that the costs will be spread out throughout the country. In other words, the oil companies aren't just in California. They're elsewhere, so I think what you'd see is probably people in the other states helping to pay for that.

Antonio Villaraigosa>> "This is an effort to move away from the addiction to oil that President Bush talked about."

Toni Guinyard>> And it's that message the Yes On Prop 87 campaign is delivering by way of political star power from Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa --

Antonio Villaraigosa>> "When I say to you that there's a green economy out there just waiting for us to invest in new technology, I'm not making it up. It's where the world's going."

Toni Guinyard>> -- to former Vice President Al Gore.

Al Gore>> "Proposition 87 means more alternative fuels and wind and solar power and that means less oil dependence."

Bob Stern>> This is new technology and there will be programs probably that won't work, so probably there will be the dry holes of the alternative fuels just as there are dry holes for the oil companies when they're drilling.

Toni Guinyard>> Chris Hall knows all about the risks of being in the oil business. Hall is one of approximately four hundred independent oil and gas producers in California.

Chris Hall>> It's a very expensive, high-risk business to be in and it takes a lot of capital investment to keep it going. The tax will prevent that from happening.

Toni Guinyard>> Hall's father and grandfather were oil men too. He considers his company and mom and pop operation, producing about two hundred barrels of oil a day for use in California.

Chris Hall>> I'm not a Chevron by any means. It's a family-owned company. It's been around for three generations. We have a small workforce of about eleven to twelve employees. We like what we do.

Toni Guinyard>> What he doesn't like is Proposition 87.

Chris Hall>> My personal belief is that we should not be ignoring any source of energy supply, whether that be alternative energy, just as we should not be ignoring domestic production in this country.

Toni Guinyard>> As with most campaigns, both sides have very different interpretations of how Proposition 87 will impact all of us. But there is one common thread. Both sides are spending millions to save billions. You're spending the oil companies' money.

Scott MacDonald>> Who cares (laughter)? I mean, what does it matter? We're at least discussing the initiative. It's not about oil companies. No one gets to vote yes or no on oil companies. No one gets to vote yes or no on campaign spending. We have to vote yes or no on Proposition 87 and it's time they talked about it. They don't talk about it.

Yusef Robb>> The yes side has to do what it can to fight back against the industry with an infinite wealth of profits from which to draw to kill Proposition 87. The oil companies have us over a barrel. We're addicted to the oil they sell. That dependence puts money in their pocket. They don't want us to have access to cleaner, cheaper energy, so the oil companies are going to spend and say and do whatever it takes to kill Proposition 87. We have to fight back.

Narrator>> "We buy their oil. They burn our flag."

Toni Guinyard>> It's a scrappy, expensive fight being waged on the airwaves.

Narrator>> "87 would shrink California's oil supply, increase dependence on foreign oil."

Toni Guinyard>> The No On Prop 87 campaign is well-financed by oil companies while money is being poured into the Yes on Prop 87 side by Hollywood producer, Stephen Bing.

Bob Stern>> Now we don't know very much about Stephen Bing. He's a multi-millionaire who's inherited some money. But we do know, at least at this point, that he doesn't seem to gaining financially by supporting this. But anytime somebody puts in forty million of his or her own money -- that never happened before -- you have to wonder why. That's a lot of money.

Toni Guinyard>> A lot of money being spent and the spending being defended by both camps.

Antonio Villaraigosa>> "I'd love to take money out of politics. One way to do that is to get our networks to cover all of these things for free. Being the fact that, you know, you guys got to make a profit as well, you can't do that."

Scott MacDonald>> When they go to that ballot box, they'll know two things for sure. They'll know the governor's race and they'll know Proposition 87 (laughter). They may not know all the ins and outs, but they will at least have had their awareness raised to the level that they will find out as much about it as they're interested in finding out.

Toni Guinyard>> And so the fate of Proposition 87 and the quest for alternative energy sources rests with the voters.

Patrick Burns>> I think that's something that's been within our grasp for a number of years, decades really, but that we haven't kind of spent enough time kind of focusing upon those particular goals.

Maya Hyams>> To have greener energy, to have alternative energy and to get away from oil and to be progressive because, in other countries, that's what they're doing.

Chris Hall>> I just think that a lot of the issues that are being brought up in Proposition 87 are obscuring some of the real discussion that ought to be taking place in determining an energy policy, whether that be for California or for the country as a whole.

Bob Stern>> This is an active place on the part of the voters and the question for the voters would be how do we feel about oil companies? How do we feel about alternative fuel sources? And do we want to tax the oil companies to pay for it? That's the bottom line question.

Toni Guinyard>> A question voters will decide November 7. I'm Toni Guinyard 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>> He's a three-star admiral with thirty-five years' experience in the United States Navy, commanding a hundred twenty ships, thousands of sailors and moving billions of dollars worth of staff and supplies around the world. What better training could you ask for to become Superintendent of the Los Angeles School District?

He is Admiral David Brewer and he was selected to succeed Governor Roy Romer as head of the nation's second largest school district. But why would a military veteran want to go into education? Hena Cuevas talked with Brewer about what his priorities will be.

David Brewer>> Well, first of all, someone submitted my name in July anonymously, so I received the call from the law search firm, HR&A, and they asked me would I be interested in submitting my resume. So I had to mull that over for a few weeks and then I finally looked at my obvious interest in educating children. We started the David and Mildred Brewer Foundation back in 1999 to help disadvantaged youth.

I made a pledge during my retirement ceremony in March of this past year that what I really wanted to do was work with disadvantaged youth for the rest of my life. But since I was in the Navy, I needed to go earn a little bit of money first before I could commit myself fully. So one of my friends said to me, "Why wait?"

I thought about it and I said, if I could come in to Los Angeles Unified School District and become the Superintendent, then in essence that would give me the ultimate stage for working with the youth and especially disadvantaged youth because this particular district, one of the most stunning statistics, has sixty-five thousand foster care children in schools here. That is stunning. So I saw this as an opportunity to work with youth, number one, but more importantly, to work with the large disadvantaged youth in this particular district.

Hena Cuevas>> How are you handling coming into a situation where there has been so much conflict between the school district and the mayor, the legislature and, all of a sudden, you just kind of get thrown into the mix?

David Brewer>> Well, my focus is on the youth. What happened before I arrived here is what I call PB, Prior to Brewer. That will sort itself out through the legal challenge and I'm not going to worry about that. The key for me is, I am going to partner with the mayor, all of the mayors, with the community, with the Board and with whomever it takes to educate these children.

Hena Cuevas>> You mentioned that you have a huge family that has a lot of educational background. Do you think that will necessarily translate into your ability to handle the school district?

David Brewer>> It has already translated into my ability. As I said in my press conference, education is in my DNA. I've talked about education all of my life, all sixty years, starting with my parents who were both educators. My wife has a doctorate in education. She plays a major role in anything that I do and she would definitely play a major role in this particular job, given her experience.

Two of my three sisters-in-law are educators, one of whom is quite a super star. Dr. Julie Williams was the Michael Milliken Award-winner for the state of Tennessee which is major award, and about two years later, she was the Principal of the Year and then subsequently became one of the Assistant Superintendents for the schools in Nashville. My sister-in-law, Abigail, basically runs the speech program in Fairfax County.

Of course, my mother-in-law and father-in-law are both -- my father-in-law was a principal of a high school for twenty-five years and my mother-in-law was a vice principal. The person who resurrected me when I dropped out of college, Howard University, back in 1967 was my Aunt Ruth, Ruth Arnold, who was a professor of English at A&M University. So as you can see, it's just inherent in what I do and I've always had that interest.

I was a Vice Chief of Naval Education and Training for over two years where I was responsible for educating and training three hundred thousand sailors worldwide, so I understand the science of learning. But being a superintendent is more than that. The principals and the teachers are the technicians. They are the ones who are running those classrooms. They are the ones who are imparting knowledge.

My job is to make sure that they get the resources that they need, that I understand what they are doing, but more importantly, that I support them in terms of contracts and facilities, working with the unions and working with the community to overcome some of the socioeconomic adverse factors that are affecting our children's abilities to learn.

Hena Cuevas>> You haven't really run a school or been an educator yourself. Do you think that brings an advantage to the position?

David Brewer>> Absolutely. That's why military rotates leaders so often. We rotate about every three or four years. One of the things that that does is, it provides a fresh perspective. A fresh perspective is extremely important. You know, there's an old saying that, if you walk in a pasture with cow manure, after a while, you lose a sense of the smell.

So in essence, the bottom line is this: you need to be fresh, fresh ideas, new people. You know, the founding fathers of this country understood that, okay? That's why you don't have, you know, kings and queens that serve in this country. You do not want people sitting in positions of leadership too long. They get stale and they lose their perspective.

Hena Cuevas>> Do you have a strategy for extending an olive branch to the mayor?

David Brewer>> Oh, absolutely. Well, there was no olive branch that needed to be extended. Frankly speaking, it was just announced Friday. I didn't have any idea at the time -- of course, I realized I was in the finals, but up until Friday, I didn't know I would be Superintendent of Schools. By nature, I am going to collaborate and partner. That's Dave's rule.

Hena Cuevas>> Does it somehow make you uncomfortable, though, that you don't have the mayor's blessing?

David Brewer>> I don't know. I'm going to meet with the mayor next week. I'm not worried about that. You know, I don't worry about things that I cannot control at this particular time. As I said before in many, many interviews, the mayor is going to find out that he and I have a lot in common and that is to educate the children of greater Los Angeles.

Announcer>> To send a comment or a question to our program, you can reach us by mail at this address:

Life and Times
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You can also call our viewer comment line (323) 953-5555) or contact us the fast way by e-mail at kcet.org.

Larry Mantle>> Welcome to FilmWeek on Life and Times. I'm Larry Mantle of 89.3 KPCC. First up this week is Clint Eastwood's directorial effort, "Flags of our Fathers", which takes us behind the scenes of that iconic photo on Iwo Jima.

[Film Clip]

Larry Mantle>> I'm joined this week by critics Jean Oppenheimer of New Times and Henry Sheehan of henrysheehan.com. Henry, "Flags of our Fathers"?

Henry Sheehan>> This is a highly anticipated film directed by Clint Eastwood that absolutely delivers. I'd say it's one of Eastwood's best films and, considering what he's done over the last ten years, that's saying a lot and I mean to say a lot. It's about basically the famous photograph of the raising of the American flag at Iwo Jima during World War II. We've all seen it and there's a statue in Washington.

It's about the big event. It's about the invasion of Iwo Jima. The scale of it is superb, but he brings it all down to individuals and explores the nature of heroism and, in a way, the nature of villainy about the three survivors of the raising of the flag and how they were brought on a cross-country trip to sell war bonds. What happens in the interaction, it's hard to get into how much there is because there's so much to this film, a real master piece.

Larry Mantle>> Jean, do you agree?

Jean Oppenheimer>> Well, I think it's definitely one of the best films of the year, but I'm not sure I would go so far as to say it's a masterpiece. I think two things about it that were most notable were the message which is just so important and so timely -- or I should say, messages because there are many in this film. But also, Eastwood's directing is just terrific. It's particularly true, I think, of the main battle sequence which, to my mind, was better than the sequence in "Saving Private Ryan" by far.

Henry Sheehan>> Yeah.

Jean Oppenheimer>> My problems with the film is that I think it looks too much like a movie. I felt for the first half that you definitely were on, you know, what was obviously a back lot of the studio and I thought that the hairdos and the costumes were much too stereotypically perfect. It was also difficult to tell the soldiers from each other. At one point, they're older men and which one corresponds to the younger one? None of that matters in the end, however, because the message of the film is just so important and so well done.

Larry Mantle>> Kirsten Dunst stars as Marie Antoinette in the film of the same title from filmmaker, Sofia Coppola.

[Film Clip]

Larry Mantle>> Jean, what did you think of "Marie Antoinette"?

Jean Oppenheimer>> I'm very mixed on this film, Larry. Sofia Coppola wanted to give it a sort of contemporary edge, so the music, while some of it is eighteenth century, most of the soundtrack is actually very contemporary, sort of post-punk rock type music. Also, nobody speaks with a French accent. She's showing Marie here not as this imperious queen, you know, who has total disregard for the suffering of her people. Instead, she's this very sort of warm and engaging teenager who's thrust into this rigid and inhospitable world stage where she really doesn't know what she's doing.

Kirsten Dunst is absolutely wonderful in this film. She's in nearly every frame of it and I think she carries the whole film. The costumes are also exquisite. The problem to me is that the film is little more than eye candy. The story doesn't really go anywhere. You know what happens chronologically because it's history, but you don't get it from the story.

Larry Mantle>> Henry, what did you think?

Henry Sheehan>> I think this is a tremendous film, actually verging on brilliance. You know, there are some filmmakers that you know, right away, right from the start of the movie, that they've really clicked on a subject and this is one of them.

It opens with a shot of Marie Antoinette lying on a day bed. She has the servant taking off her shoes and she's looking right at the camera with a kind of come-hither look. Then we move to the next couple of shots which are someone opening a window and saying "Get up" and you see that it's Marie Antoinette, a teenage girl lying in bed with her puppy, getting out of bed. You can tell she's a little coddled. And then after that, there's a shot of a huge Austrian palace which she's leaving.

Here you see, you know, what Coppola's going to examine. The Marie Antoinette of the popular image that was put forth at the time and through history, the teenage girl, just a teenage girl, a na�ve coddled girl, and then third, the one who's being forced to undergo the crush of history. That's what we see and I think that's the explanation for the pop music, which doesn't take up really that much of the time. I think this is a wonderful film, a rich film. Kirsten Dunst is absolutely marvelous.

Larry Mantle>> Our third film this week is adapted from Augustene Burroughs' memoirs. "Running with Scissors" stars Annette Bening and Brian Cox.

[Film Clip]

Larry Mantle>> "Running with Scissors", Henry Sheehan?

Henry Sheehan>> Yeah, this film, you know, it's unfortunate that it's coming out this week (laughter) when there are especially good films because I thought this film was a total failure of direction. It's directed by Ryan Murphy who has a good television background with "Nip/Tuck". He also adapted the memoirs of Augustene Burroughs who grew up in a strange family situation, very close to his highly eccentric mother played by Annette Bening, a distant father played by Alec Baldwin, very small role. The father's out of the question early on.

The mother comes under the influence of a charismatic psychiatrist played by Brian Cox and she signs her son over to his care. He runs an extremely eccentric household. This is a narcissistic film. We all see everything. The only time the characters matter is when they say, "How do they feel about Augustene Burroughs?" They have no life away from their opinion of him. The only one who shows any talent in this film is Richard Sherman, the production designer.

Larry Mantle>> And finally this week, the documentary, "The World According to Sesame Street". Now this isn't done by Sesame Street itself or by PBS, though you will be able to see it coming up next Tuesday night here on KCET. The film tells the story of the challenges Sesame Street's creators have traveling the world and adapting the show.

[Film Clip]

Larry Mantle>> "The World According to Sesame Street". What did you think, Jean?

Jean Oppenheimer>> Well, despite the title, this is not an expanded version of a Sesame Street episode. It's not something you're going to plunk your kids down in front of the television for. Instead, it's a behind-the-scenes look of how the Sesame Street Workshop, which is the nonprofit educational organization which produces Sesame Street, is attempting to produce a lot of international versions of the show. These are very culturally specific to whatever country they're in.

Each show is within the culture of the particular country in terms of the Muppets, the characters, the music, obviously the language. The first half hour of this documentary is pretty deadly boring. All I can say is, stay with it because after that it's wonderful. The people who work for this Sesame Street Workshop are just marvelous people. What they're doing is so important. I mean, at the end of this film, I really thought that these guys deserve the Nobel Peace Prize.

Larry Mantle>> That's it for another FilmWeek on Life and Times. I'm Larry Mantle of 89.3 KPCC joined by critics Henry Sheehan of henrysheehan.com and Jean Oppenheimer of New Times. Thanks for joining us. We'll see you next week for the next FilmWeek on Life and Times.

Val Zavala>> For the hour version of FilmWeek, tune in to KPCC radio on Fridays at eleven a.m. And that's our program. 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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