With four bases in San Antonio in bed with an archconservative Catholic presence, and a media that makes heroes of our poorest, most naive soldiers so that our young believe that War is right and good, there are plenty of us who say NO. Gracias to all the writers who participated and submitted. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9g5IYGsHlY

At the Media Reform Conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota last week, Fox News pursued Bill Moyers. How do the Fox Journalists sleep at night?

When I worked with la Vicki Grise at the Esperanza years ago, it was obvious to me she was a star. She had presence, wit, maldiciones and fideo-love. What else do you need? Between her and Irma Mayorga, the Ph.D from Stanford playwright and resident creative genius, they conceived and produced The Panza Monologues . Vicki has now finished her second year at Cal Arts - the nation's top program in the performing arts and Irma teaches theatre at Florida State University, where she is a star tambien. http://www.facebook.com/pages/Irma-Mayorga/12900109138?ref=share Some musings from Vicki on not getting to premiere The Panza Monologues in San Anto this summer: una notitita (ok its a notitote but not a mitote) we will be filming the panza monologues in Los Angeles August 2nd. i am of course dissapointed that we werent able to do the filming in ourhome town (ran around woodlawn lake this morning - so glad to be home)but i'm actually not angry. so many people have opened up space...

San Antonio has cultura but no place or money to see high-quality theatre. (See my story on the Panza Monologues in the next blog). And very little discussion about WHY this is happening. (See the blog after that) Intro: This past May 10th, 2008, the City of San Antonio approved a gigantic Bond Package that included 100 million dollars for a Performing Arts Center at the Municipal Auditorium downtown...I've heard the Mayor say he wants Opera (which I love too, but chinelas...) BELOW IS A POST FROM PABLO MARTINEZ, POET AND CULTURAL ACTIVIST (with my edits): In 2000, I returned to San Antonio after 14 years in New York City, where I worked at the New York Philharmonic and two major arts funding agencies. Not long after my return, I had lunch with a high-ranking city official. As we talked about San Antonio's future, he observed that the city was nearing the threshold of immense change. "We can go in either of two directions," he speculated. "We can become a...

Vicki Grise is from San Antonio, and so is Irma Mayorga. Together, they created The Panza Monologues, which has toured throughout the country, except here. Why? There is no place to perform. And if there is a place, there is no funding for them. The Guadalupe is recovering from a nightmarish board and directors, and Say Si cancelled at the last moment. I've always wondered why San Antonio doesn't have an established Chicana/o Theatre Program at one of the universities, why we don't have an Equity City Theatre, why we don't have Chicano Chakespeare, why Cherrie Moraga's Media didn't perform here, so many whys and neither Vicki or Irma live here anymore. And now we have a multi-million City bond package that just passed and very little debate about its merits. (Read what Pablo Martinez has to say about that in next blog). THIS IS WHAT WE DESERVE IN SAN ANTONIO! SEE THE VIDEO!

In Minneapolis this past week, thousands of people gathered to challenge the corporatized bottom-feed media brought to us courtesy of Presidents Reagan, Clinton and Bush - it's called media deregulation. http://www.freepress.net/conference In a democracy, the media should be free. People like me - and you - should be represented and it shouldn't be about selling ads on the front page of the newspaper or sex ads filling up the alternative paper or mainstream views on public radio. Television news should be local, and not focused on ambulance chasing and violence. We get the media we deserve. Let your Congressman and Senators know how you feel.