Category: Editorial Page 1 of 36

In this age of Donald J. Trump and the Mueller investigation, you can expect updates on what is happening to our country and its Constitution.

San Antonio, Texas, on February 28th, 2026

By Connie Wilson

On March 2, 2026

In Editorial, Essays on Politics: Best Political Essays & Ideology, Movies, Of Local (Quad Cities') Interest, Politics, Pop Culture, Texas

Elise Wilson on Feb. 28, 2026.

On Saturday, February 28th, 2026, we journeyed to San Antonio to watch granddaughter Elise play in a volleyball tournament. The tournament featured the CTX (Central Texas) team, not the school team, but the short snip of Elise playing with her Valor School team at the bottom of the page will give you an idea of what the past three years have meant for her as volleyball player/Captain of her school team (and for us as spectators and fans). We really enjoy seeing her play. I’m so lucky that volleyball was the game of choice, as my enthusiasm for soccer, hockey, et. al., is not nearly as high.

As senior year approaches, we will miss watching Elise do so well as a team member of two volleyball teams. She played very well again on Feb. 28, 2026. I’m sure she will benefit from everything she has learned about teamwork during these last three years. Another tournament in Reno beckons in May.

View from our Mariott AC hotel in downtown San Antonio.

San Antonio is about an hour’s drive away. The location of the tournament was quite a long way from the downtown Alamo tourist spots. After the last two games ended, (which Elise’s team won), we checked into a Mariott downtown with the name AC (which instantly made me think of Air Conditioning).

As my husband went to check us in, he left me in the car with the window open. I was sitting there minding my own business on this balmy night when a woman with a group of passers-by began telling me “Jesus loves you.” I responded, “Good.”

A few more of the group began “chatting” (if that is the right term) with me through the open window ( I am IN the car, waiting for the spouse to check in; the group of 10 is on the sidewalk). I was not in any way indicating that I wanted or needed a sermon right from the streets of San Antonio, but that is what I got.

After the religious talk ceased slightly, I suggested that the members of this random group vote in the March 3rd primary election (They seemed harmless, but later that night, in Austin, a gunman shot and killed 2 people on 6th Street and wounded 14 others, so...). James Talarico is squaring off against Jasmine Crockett to see who runs against a GOP opponent in November. The MAGA crowd is much more concerned about a male opponent than a Black female friend of Kamala Harris’s. Likely MAGA candidate will be incumbent John Cornyn, so we may be witnessing another Beto O’Rourke moment. Or not. Who knows?

Dining along the Riverwalk.

If Texas continues to attract voters from other states because of its beautiful winter weather and its reasonable cost of living, could it represent ALL Texans, including new ones from other states? [Assuming we have fair elections that aren’t rigged and that aren’t called off because of a power grab from the top.]

Maybe some day we could have a few Democrats in office other than just GOP Trump-friendly folk? Is it time to loosen the GOP stranglehold on this very red state? Maybe we could have a different governor than Abbott, who has been in a wheelchair for years from a long-ago accident when a tree fell on him while he was jogging.

Abbott brags about how he went to work every day with the sole purpose of lodging lawsuits against Barack Obama during Obama’s two terms. There seems to be a lot of anger that we elected a Black President who did a good job, tried to help the average citizen with a Healthcare program, and whom most people liked. A God-fearing happily married husband and father who represented us articulately abroad, but was castigated for not wearing a flag pin on a tan suit, as though that were grounds for impeachment. And please get rid of Texas’s Kenneth Paxton. His own party seems to have disowned him. His whistleblower staff outed him. His wife divorced him. (Etc., etc., etc.)

Riverwalk.

Maybe don’t vote for the guy who brags that he has voted with DJT “99% of the time.” (Cornyn) Maybe don’t vote for the guy who puts MAGA in the middle of his campaign slogan (Middleton) and is totally down with things going on in places like Minneapolis or Venezuela. (I did not say “Or Iran” because we can debate Iran’s nuclear ambitions and their stated national goals, but now we’ve martyred their 37-year leader at a time when the experts say there was no “imminent” danger of nuclear weapons being feasible. How popular will we be with Iran’s devoutly religious average citizen whose cities we are busy blowing up?)

It seems that the goal for the incumbent 47th President is to leave a huge mark on the U.S.—and an equally huge mark on the world scene— by throwing U.S. military weight around as bullies and barbarians at the gate, an image that we spent over 60 years trying to undo. ($20 million a day just to float around off the coast of Iran; the need for an excuse to cancel elections and distract from the Epstein files really loomed large.) Plus, there’s the tacky gold redecorating and the proposed Arch de Triomphe that would dwarf the Lincoln Monument (not to mention the embarrassing pleas for trophies and the Nobel Peace Prize and that FIFA monstrosity.)

DJT seems to be arbitrarily instigating decades of war to re-emerge, despite such world wars in Europe involving the U.S. being dormant (because of NATO and negotiating and diplomacy) since 1945 (Remember: Now it’s not the Secretary of DEFENSE; it’s the Secretary of WAR. And it’s not the Gulf of Mexico, either, if you want to rewrite history. Which seems like the goal here.) Putin is pleased that, as a nation, we are repeatedly shooting ourselves in the feet.

Tearing everything down was always the goal of the corrupt Steve Bannon (guilty of fraud) and his interview with Errol Morris should be required viewing if you love our democratic norms and the Constitution that DJT tramples on daily. [2018 Steve Bannon interview “American Dharma”] It’s the blueprint of Project 2025, which DJT always claimed he knew nothing about—until he began following it to the letter.

A good Christian candidate in the Democratic primary March 3rd for Senator is Democrat James Talarico, who is studying to be a Presbyterian minister. His grandfather was a Baptist minister. If Jesus/God loves us (me, anyway, according to the woman on the sidewalk) why did She let the current occupant of the White House wrest power back in 2024? [THAT was a bad move!] Why select a convicted malignant narcissist racist misogynistic felon with pedophile tendencies who has appointed only incompetents and enriches his friends and family while doing little for the rest of us? As another huckster (P.T. Barnum) once said, “There’s a sucker born every minute.”

DJT has appointed Cabinet members like Howard Lutnick, Secretary of Commerce. Lutnick was also linked to Jeffrey Epstein and admitted to having lunch with Epstein on his island (and he took his wife and kids!). And THAT guy is still around and showing up in international negotiations, sadly. Or RFK, Jr., who is bringing back measles and whooping cough and shutting down research on mrNA vaccines and childhood cancer. Or the woman who shot her dog (Ice Barbie, Krsti Noem, former Governor of South Dakota) who is now supervising the group (ICE) that is shooting citizens in places like Minneapolis. Or Crazy Eyes Kash Patel, widely considered an incompetent buffoon within the FBI/CIA ranks–with good reason. The list goes on and on.

Trump’s kakistocracy (look it up) doesn’t inspire confidence. Makes me less positive about the Deity’s judgment, but nevermind. Talarico believes in the separation of church and state and so do I. I also believe in the Constitution, which is being completely trampled on at the moment on so many levels.

I’m not cool with alienating all of our allies and bombing boats and countries, even if the countries, themselves, as Lindsey Graham has long believed, needed a good old-fashioned bombing. Cutting off the oil to Cuba and China sounds good until you realize that China, if it seizes Taiwan, will be controlling all of the high-end computer chips that our technology must have to function. (We have ignored this warning for years about Taiwan making 90% of the high end computer chips.) And what if the Chinese were to start in on our currency situation, as Michael Moore warned about in his 2009 documentary “Capitalism: A Love Story.” I suggest you watch it, too. (Too many documentaries; too little time.)

Downtown San Antonio from our hotel.

The bombing of Iran will not only keep MAGA from continuing to ask those pesky questions about DJT’s best friend, Jeffrey Epstein (or so he hopes) but will probably cause Trump to try to suspend mid-terms for a “national emergency” that he totally created, since there is data to support the position that Iran was already tottering on its damaged feet and incapable of using nukes against us (too far away). I’m okay with bombing the nuclear sites, but didn’t DJT tell us they were “completely obliterated” quite a while ago? Apparently not, if you need a distraction from the Epstein files.

And let’s not forget: anything to seize power and install friends and family in positions of leadership if you’re Donald John Trump. You want a pardon? Hit him up—for a fee. How about the money Melania pocketed for her quasi-fashion-documentary? (No corruption here—right? And I haven’t even mentioned the Qatar jet plane.) And now the GOP faithful, falling into line behind DJT and spending pots of money, has set their sights on buying up media (CBS, etc.) and distorting our ability to receive real news, just like in Russia, where Putin set about putting the media under his thumb to seize and keep power. (*Note to Fox fans: when lawsuits were underway recently, Fox News claimed to be an entertainment channel, not a news channel, as a defense.) We have already seen Stephen Colbert bite the dust and the Washington Post is dying in broad daylight, rather than in darkness. Can Jimmy Kimmel and Seth Meyer be far behind?

Soon we may have WWF wrestling on the lawn of the White House to celebrate the years since 1976 to 2026, our Semiquincentennial (250th birthday). Trump’s already ruined the Kennedy Center, so there goes any U.S. claim to culture [with more downgrades to come.] Remember when Pablo Casals played at the White House, November 13, 1961? No? Well, I do. Casals played in the East wing (now torn down by Trump without any permission and with LOTS of money pouring into Trump’s hands from “donors” to build—the wall?). I was 16 years old and JFK’s time in office was the epitome of class and culture for the Presidents I have known, which go back to Truman. And Donald James Trump represents the tackiest and least competent President—even eclipsing “W” of all time. (Which is going some!)

External audio
You may hear Pau Casals performing Antonín Dvorak‘s “Cello Concerto” with George Szell conducting the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra in 1937 Here

Under Trump, for culture, you have to content yourself with a third-rate country singer or Kid Rock or KISS–except that one of them recently died and KISS retired but got the Medal of Honor along with hate-monger Rush Limbaugh— so, yes, DJT is old, as well, and hardly “cutting edge” regarding culture in the U.S.

We may well have Vince McMahon of the WWE putting on a wrestling tournament on the White House lawn, instead. After all, Trump has already appointed McMahon’s wife, Linda, to be in charge of the SBA (Small Business Administration.) Linda McMahon: another member of the kakistocracy. (How very presidential of DJT.)

Netanyahu and Trump are a lot alike in continued clinging to power and favoritism (and pardons) for their cronies. Yes, the avowed Iranian post-Shah mantras were (1) Death to America (2) Death to Israel (3) Women must wear head garb and never have a say in government. So, not waiting until the already 86-year old died of natural causes probably looked like a good idea (especially since there were many more like him to come), but will the Iranian people agree? It isn’t as though this administration, which unleashed DOGE on us, surgically figured out a way, Maduro-like, to off the Ayatollah. Not at all–thanks to the influence of the Lindsey Grahams and the Benjamin Netanyahus, we are still bombing Iran.

Reza Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran’s oldest son, in 2025.

It appears that the Shah’s son—long gone from Iran after Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi’s overthrow in 1979—may be being groomed to return to Iran and rule. In a “60 Minutes” interview tonight the Shah’s son denied any desire to be a King or a President. He just wants to be a “transitional leader,”since 48 Iranian leaders were killed in the very recent bombing. Of course, the Shah’s now-grown son also admits to consulting with the White House and being in touch with Congress. Hmmmmm…

Meanwhile, San Antonio beckoned. Good idea to get away.

We had a lovely meal at an outdoor venue, enjoying the eighty-degree weather. It’s hard to believe that we are going to have weather this warm for the next two weeks with nothing lower than seventy degrees. And yet when I turn on my television, I see blizzards in the Northeast, temperatures in the single digits in places like Minneapolis (the “nice” neighbors in Minnesota who are standing up for their Constitutional rights while they still have them), and not-very-warm readings in cities and towns like Cedar Rapids, Des Moines, and Independence (Iowa). But the worst of the weather has been the massive amount of snow in places like Central Park (NYC) and Massachusetts and even the cold temperatures in Florida. (“But there’s no global warming,and all of the brakes on carbon emissions have been kicked to the curb.”)

So, enjoy volleyball while we all wait for the other shoe (or bomb) to drop. Here are my two lovely 17-year-old twin granddaughters, Elise (blonde, left) and Ava (brunette, right) eating ice cream on the Riverwalk.

Elise & Ava in San Antonio.

San Antonio Riverwalk.

Text of Mark Carney, Prime Minister of Canada, at Davos

By Connie Wilson

On February 1, 2026

In Editorial, Essays on Politics: Best Political Essays & Ideology, Politics

This blog contains the full transcript of a special address by Mark Carney, Prime Minister of Canada, delivered at the World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting 2026 in Davos.
Carney emphasized the end of the rules-based international order and outlined how Canada was adapting by building strategic autonomy while maintaining values like human rights and sovereignty.
The Canadian PM called for middle powers, such as his own, to work together to counter the rise of hard power and the great power rivalry, in order to build a more cooperative, resilient world.

This transcript was produced using AI and subsequently edited for style and clarity. The edits do not alter the substance of the speaker’s remarks.

Thank you very much, Larry. I’m going to start in French, and then I’ll switch back to English.

[The following is translated from French]

Thank you, Larry. It is both a pleasure, and a duty, to be with you tonight in this pivotal moment that Canada and the world going through.

Today I will talk about a rupture in the world order, the end of a pleasant fiction and the beginning of a harsh reality, where geopolitics, where the large, main power, geopolitics, is submitted to no limits, no constraints.

On the other hand, I would like to tell you that the other countries, especially intermediate powers like Canada, are not powerless. They have the capacity to build a new order that encompasses our values, such as respect for human rights, sustainable development, solidarity, sovereignty and territorial integrity of the various states.

The power of the lesser power starts with honesty.[Carney returns to speaking in English]

It seems that every day we’re reminded that we live in an era of great power rivalry, that the rules based order is fading, that the strong can do what they can, and the weak must suffer what they must.

And this aphorism of Thucydides is presented as inevitable, as the natural logic of international relations reasserting itself.

And faced with this logic, there is a strong tendency for countries to go along to get along, to accommodate, to avoid trouble, to hope that compliance will buy safety.

Well, it won’t.

So, what are our options?

In 1978, the Czech dissident Václav Havel, later president, wrote an essay called The Power of the Powerless, and in it, he asked a simple question: how did the communist system sustain itself?

And his answer began with a greengrocer.

Every morning, this shopkeeper places a sign in his window: ‘Workers of the world unite’. He doesn’t believe it, no-one does, but he places a sign anyway to avoid trouble, to signal compliance, to get along. And because every shopkeeper on every street does the same, the system persist – not through violence alone, but through the participation of ordinary people in rituals they privately know to be false.

Havel called this “living within a lie”.

The system’s power comes not from its truth, but from everyone’s willingness to perform as if it were true, and its fragility comes from the same source. When even one person stops performing, when the greengrocer removes his sign, the illusion begins to crack. Friends, it is time for companies and countries to take their signs down.

For decades, countries like Canada prospered under what we called the rules-based international order. We joined its institutions, we praised its principles, we benefited from its predictability. And because of that, we could pursue values-based foreign policies under its protection.

We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false that the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient, that trade rules were enforced asymmetrically. And we knew that international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.

This fiction was useful, and American hegemony, in particular, helped provide public goods, open sea lanes, a stable financial system, collective security and support for frameworks for resolving disputes.

So, we placed the sign in the window. We participated in the rituals, and we largely avoided calling out the gaps between rhetoric and reality.

This bargain no longer works. Let me be direct. We are in the midst of a rupture, not a transition.

Over the past two decades, a series of crises in finance, health, energy and geopolitics have laid bare the risks of extreme global integration. But more recently, great powers have begun using economic integration as weapons, tariffs as leverage, financial infrastructure as coercion, supply chains as vulnerabilities to be exploited.

You cannot live within the lie of mutual benefit through integration, when integration becomes the source of your subordination.

The multilateral institutions on which the middle powers have relied – the WTO, the UN, the COP – the architecture, the very architecture of collective problem solving are under threat. And as a result, many countries are drawing the same conclusions that they must develop greater strategic autonomy, in energy, food, critical minerals, in finance and supply chains.

And this impulse is understandable. A country that can’t feed itself, fuel itself or defend itself, has few options. When the rules no longer protect you, you must protect yourself.

But let’s be clear eyed about where this leads.

A world of fortresses will be poorer, more fragile and less sustainable. And there is another truth. If great powers abandon even the pretense of rules and values for the unhindered pursuit of their power and interests, the gains from transactionalism will become harder to replicate.

Hegemons cannot continually monetize their relationships.

Allies will diversify to hedge against uncertainty.

They’ll buy insurance, increase options in order to rebuild sovereignty – sovereignty that was once grounded in rules, but will increasingly be anchored in the ability to withstand pressure.

This room knows this is classic risk management. Risk management comes at a price, but that cost of strategic autonomy, of sovereignty can also be shared.

“American Doctor” Screens at Sundance 2026

By Connie Wilson

On January 29, 2026

In Editorial, Essays on Politics: Best Political Essays & Ideology, Mexico, Movies, Politics, Pop Culture, Reviews

A still from American Doctor byPoh Si Teng, an official selection of the 2026 Sundance Film Festival. (Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Ibrahim Al Otla.)

“American Doctor” is a Sundance documentary that follows three physicians grappling with the unbearable gap between what they’ve witnessed in Gaza volunteering at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Yunis and what the world is willing to acknowledge regarding the reality of what is going on in Gaza. As I watched this documentary I recognized the familiar feeling that, when those in power lack human morality and compassion, the real life crises you are witnessing feel hopeless. The doctors’ concern that their efforts are futile is just one more battle to be fought.

It doesn’t matter if we’re talking about senseless violence in the Ukraine, Gaza, Iran or Minneapolis, the feeling is the same. As articulated at one point by one of the doctors in this powerful documentary: “There’s an institutional trend to silence and speaking out about this. From the boards of every single university, from the boards of hospitals: they just don’t care at what cost this is achieved…Most American physicians are horrified, but they are too frightened to speak up….” Consider that documentary statement as it relates to January 6^th, Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, and victims of senseless violence in any ongoing war: “They don’t give a shit about anybody else as long as they kill the person they’re after.”

CINEMATOGRAPHERS

Director Poh Si Teng keeps the cameras closely focused on the work of three American doctors in Gaza at the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Yunis, letting the doctors’ exhaustion, anger, and quiet despair speak louder than any narration. Cinematographers include Ibrahim Al-Otta, Ramzy Haddad, Arthur Nazaryan, Chris Rentaria, and Poh Si Teng, with editing by Ema Ryan Yamazaki and Christopher White.

The result is a film that radiates a specific kind of helplessness — not the helplessness of uninvolved bystanders, but of experts who have seen the consequences of violence up close and personal and still can’t get anyone to listen to them. We see the physicians returning to the United States to speak to representatives at Chuck Schumer’s office, John Cornyn’s office, Ted Cruz’s office—all for naught. This feeling of tilting at windmills is so widespread, so ubiquitous, that you walk away from the experience of this film overwhelmed by the realization that Kelly Ann Conway’s “alternative facts,” when truth is what is required in society, has contributed mightily to the mess we are all now mired in.

THE DOCTORS

“The American” doctors followed in the Sundance documentary are (l to r) Dr. Thaer Ahmad, Dr. Mark Perlmutter, Director Poh Si Teng and Dr. Fereze Sidhwa. (Photo from AFT)

The doctors are Dr. Fereze Sidhwa, a trauma surgeon from California and a Zoroastrian who actively wonders whether his inability to let the injustice of this genocide go on without protesting proactively in perpetuity is what is keeping him from finding the girl of his dreams. Dr. Mark Perlmutter: a Jewish orthopedic surgeon from North Carolina. As a Jew, he is more at liberty to speak out against the repressive far right regime of Benjamin Netanyahu, and he does so. He also shares that his father was a physician who helped concentration camp survivors in World War II, upon arriving with U.S. forces. The third doctor is Dr. Thaer Ahmad, a Palestinian-America from Chicago who is an Emergency Room doctor in real life with a wife and two darling children. He encounters more hassles than the other two doctors just to be allowed to enter Gaza as a volunteer, often being left at the border by red tape just hours before entry. (“It’s a degree of inconvenience that’s essential. The Israelis choose to notify you that you are not being allowed in literally the night before.”)

All three are risking their lives to go into Gaza and attempt to treat dire injuries under the most primitive conditions. Since the Israeli Army intentionally targets hospitals, there is nowhere for the trapped populace—especially the children—to seek care. The doctors banded together to write an opinion/editorial entitled “As Surgeons We Have Never Seen Such Cruelty Like Israel’s Genocide in Gaza.” The X-ray machine at Nasser Medical Complex has been broken for 11 months; there are only 2 operating rooms.

THE TASK

The three weary doctors are followed amongst their colleagues in Gaza through the halls and operating rooms of the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis. In the 1 hour and 33 minute film, the hospital is hit by Israeli forces three times. In the film’s finale, a rocket hits the second floor men’s surgical ward, incinerating a 15-year-old boy whom the doctors had just saved. We see two little boys, aged 2, dead and brought in carried in their grieving father’s arms. A ten-year-old has no pulse in her left arm and shrapnel injuries to her foot. If she survives, she is going to lose both legs and her left arm. Early in the film, the doctors remark on the number of children brought in with gunshot wounds to the head, which they say cannot be simply accidental. The killing of children here is 600 times that in the Ukrainian conflict.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest civil rights and advocacy organization, has called for streaming platforms in America to carry this documentary, saying: “This important documentary shows, through the eyes of three heroic Americans, the reality of Israel’s genocide in Gaza. All Americans should see this film. We urge all streaming services in the nation and worldwide to host and promote the film.”

POLITICS ASIDE

Poh Si Teng, director of American Doctor, an official selection of the 2026 Sundance Film Festival. (Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Marcus Yam.)

After Dr. Ahmad appears with Dana Bash on CNN, he received a particularly hostile e-mail cheering for “Hamas to renege on the hostage deal before the Sunday deadline so that Israel can finish the job of eliminating the presence forever of every single Palestinian member of Hamas. Chew on that, Doctor.” The Israelis have protested that the Palestinian Hamas forces often hid their headquarters under hospitals, to avoid detection. Israel used that as their justification for bombing hospitals. We are all aware of the precipitating event when 251 civilians in Israel were kidnapped by Hamas on October 7, 2023.

Dr. Ahmad’s response is: “I’m not a spokesperson for anybody. I’m not ‘pro’ anything. I’m a Palestinian who wants to see babies that look like my babies not being killed any more.” Over 1700 health care workers have lost their lives in Gaza since Israel launched its retaliatory attack on Gaza. 94% of the hospitals in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed, including the Nasser Medical Complex.

The U.S. has provided $21.7 billion in military aid to Israel since October 7, 2023, when Hamas attacked Israel and took 251 hostages, according to a report by Brown University’s Watson School of International and Public Affairs.

EMOTIONS UPON DEPARTURE

At the end of the film, on March 18, 2025, when most of the Nasser Hospital seemingly collapses after bombing, the doctors must leave; they feel guilt. “When you leave, you really feel that you have no right to leave. You get this feeling of a kind of shame,” says Dr. Fereze Sidhwa. “I don’t feel like I should have left, because nobody was there and nobody was coming in to replace me. I think it would have been better to have stayed on. I had some access to media and to people who could write about these things.” Also articulated is this thought: “The people in Gaza told us that we have to advocate on their behalf. None of us wants to, but we all feel a sense of duty.”

Peer-reviewed analysis in The Lancet estimated 64,260 traumatic deaths in Gaza by June 30, 2024, rising to over 70,000 by October 2024.
Demographics: Studies indicate that 59.1% of these deaths in Gaza are women, children, and the elderly.
Over 100,000 Palestinians have been injured.

CONCLUSION

A companion piece for “American Doctor” is 2024’s “No Other Land,” a film made by a Palestinian-Israeli collective that shows the destruction of the occupied West Banks’ Masafer Yatta by Israeli soldiers.

“American Doctor” is a very powerful firsthand account of what has happened and is happening in Gaza, told by those who have made multiple trips there to try to help. As the “Vanity Fair” Sundance team that wandered into this one when they couldn’t get into “Shitheads” said, “It’s the most powerful thing we’ve seen at Sundance, so far.”

“American Doctor” underscores the need for people of good moral fiber to stand up against and speak out against injustice anywhere, whether in a place far from home or on our own doorstep. If it is wrong and the PTB have presented a “truth” or rationale built on lies, that must be called out by people of good conscience.

From “American Doctor:” “First responders and journalists are being attacked. Every aspect of life has bee destroyed. There’s been no accountability. Who is going to bring the perpetrators to justice? Who is going to prosecute them? Who is going to confront the perpetrators in a way that they cannot rest without seeing us. It’s the only way that we can achieve accountability and justice.”

Do those words from “American Doctor” apply in other settings?

Yes, they do.

Let’s all act like we get the message that might does NOT make right and we must unite,as Minnesota has, to stand up for our neighbors and the sanctity of human life.

HollyShorts Concludes Second UK Edition

By Connie Wilson

On November 18, 2025

In Editorial, Pop Culture, Reviews

HollyShorts brought a dose of Hollywood to London this week as its second U.K. edition wrapped with a sold-out awards ceremony at Vue Cinemas West End, where Franz Böhm’s Rock, Paper, Scissors and Sam Davis’ The Singers emerged as the night’s top winners.

The Oscar-qualifying short film festival, now growing a sizable satellite presence in Europe, the Middle East, and North America, drew filmmakers from across three continents as it continues positioning itself as one of the world’s leading incubators for short-form talent.

The awards were hosted by Karen Bryson MBE who recently starred in The Rainmaker and is also loved for The Teacher.

Böhm & Davis Lead the 2025 Winners List

Böhm’s Rock, Paper, Scissors scored the Best Short Film Grand Prize, earning a £20,000 Panavision lens package and a prize package from Essex Bouqcakes. The film also claimed Best Student Film, cementing Böhm as one of the event’s breakout names.

Davis’ The Singers delivered a parallel sweep, taking Best Director, presented by Cotrini Skin Care with a £5,000 post-production package from The Farm, and Best International Film.

2025 HollyShorts UK Award Winners

Best Short Film Grand Prize
Rock, Paper, Scissors, Franz Böhm
Prize: £20,000 Panavision lens package, Essex Bouqcakes prize package

Best Director, Presented by Cotrini Skincare with £5,000 Post Production Package from The Farm
The Singers, Sam Davis

Best Student Film
Rock, Paper, Scissors, Franz Böhm

Best Animation
Two Black Boys in Paradise, Baz Sells

Best Comedy
Chasers, Erin Brown Thomas

Best Drama, Presented by Le Kool Champagne
A Friend of Dorothy, Lee Knight

Best Thriller
ADO, Sam Henderson

Best International, Presented by Sushi Samba
The Singers, Sam Davis

Best Music Video
Bile Bile, Rango Musau

Best Music Documentary
Hugel – The Entourage, Ludovic Genco, Hugo Lucas Pompier

Best Sports Documentary
Fighting Demons, Simon Stock

Best Shot on Film, Presented by Kodak Motion Pictures
A Death in the Family, Yasmin Hafesji

Best Cinematography, Prize Package Presented by ShotDeck
Stomach Bug, Andri Haraldsson

HollyShorts Expands Into 2026

The festival also announced its largest global expansion to date. HollyShorts UK will return for its third edition November 12–15, 2026, with submissions for the 2026 cycle opening tomorrow. HollyShorts Dubai is set to run December 12–14, 2025, extending the brand’s reach in the Middle East.

The year will conclude with the 22nd edition of the flagship HollyShorts Film Festival in Hollywood, scheduled for August 13–23, 2026.

Founded in 2005, HollyShorts remains a key discovery platform for emerging filmmakers, with Academy Awards-qualifying and BAFTA qualifying categories and deep partnerships across production, post, and distribution sectors. Sponsors for the 2026 London event include Cotrini Skincare, IMGN, Miller Insurance, LeKool Champagne, Panavision, Alta Global, Dumont Luxury Real Estate, Essex Boucakes, Sushi Samba, The Farm, Kodak, and others.

From Substack: This Will Hold

By Connie Wilson

On October 29, 2025

In Editorial, Essays on Politics: Best Political Essays & Ideology, Politics

Breaking the American Spirit: Trump’s Recreational Depravity Has An Agenda

To Christian Nationalists, Even Hitler Was Forgiven

This Will Hold

Oct 29

Evil on Steroids

To be clear, when we say “Trump,” understand we’re talking about the Heritage Foundation’s agenda. Trump and his tigers, elephants, and giraffes are not the ones steering this country, although it’s evident he’s enjoying the cruelty. The infrastructure behind him—ideological, financial, and operational—is what’s actually in control.

Elon Musk and the DOGE boys served as the slash-and-burn team, generating the chaos and distraction required for the early stages of Project 2025 to move forward. Trump is simply the vehicle the Heritage Foundation used to gain power.

Do they really intend to deport all brown immigrants, including birthright citizens? They’re certainly trying; the Supreme Court has the case on its docket. And if they succeed, who will work the agricultural jobs? Well, what happens when millions are unemployed, hungry, and sick? Crime rates increase.

So why the new prisons and camps? To house the “new criminals.” And what happens to those criminals? They become “free labor” in the fields.

The Heritage Foundation and the tech bros are building their own fiefdom. Sound far-fetched? More than 40 million Americans are about to lose their SNAP benefits. 13.8 million have already been laid off under Trump’s administration. The uninsured population could climb to 31 million or more by 2026. And when enhanced ACA subsidies expire on December 31, 2025, premiums are projected to increase 114% for 22 million Americans.

Now add the ridiculous tariffs designed to skyrocket the cost of living, along with every other heinous policy meant to push the American people to the brink of despair.

How will they control all these people? With the “law enforcement” they’ve created to report to the Executive Branch, of course.

The ICE Budget for Weaponry

Puppy-killer Kristi Noem received two luxury jets valued at $200 million, and ICE is flush with cash like a hog at the trough with a $170 billion budget. It’s as if torment and cruelty are now line items in America’s priorities.

In 2019 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) spent just $5.7 million on the “small arms” category through October 18; during Trump’s first administration the government averaged about $8.4 million per year. In 2025, ICE has increased that weapons spending by 600 percent. In the last nine months alone, they have spent $71,515,762 on purchases listed as “small arms, ordnance, and ordnance accessories manufacturing.”

Think about that: the MAGA Big Budget Bill made ICE the largest federal law enforcement agency in the nation’s history, with a budget larger than most of the world’s militaries and a 600 percent increase in weapons spending.

This is a domestic enforcement agency—not going to war “over there,” but here: in our streets, against our people.

Blonde and Blue Jesus Forgives Them

I listen to pundits ask, “Why? Why would Republicans give up all their power? Aren’t they concerned about legacy? Why have they abdicated all authority to this Epstein-adjacent convicted felon?”

In short: The GOP has spent more than forty years twisting, remolding, and regurgitating Christian nationalist rhetoric until this moment feels like their long-awaited “crusade.” In their worldview, all one has to do is believe that a white Jesus was the Son of God—and their eternal elevator will come equipped with an “up” button.

Yes, Jesus is their get-out-of-Hell-free card—because in their version of Christianity even Hitler is forgiven. And what is “legacy” when the people destroying history are the ones holding the pen—what does it even mean to be on “the right side” of it?

“Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” – George Orwell, 1984

The Republican Party of fiscal responsibility and rule of law is dead. In its place stands a movement that made a deal with the devil: fall in line behind Trump and his whims, or be destroyed in a primary. And as we’ve seen over the past year with Elon Musk, the DOGE boys, and the election data, it’s no longer just the voters deciding who wins—at least not in elections large enough to cross a certain vote-count threshold.

Their recreational depravity is evil on steroids, and I feel it every time I scroll the news or check on a friend who’s barely hanging on. You probably feel it too. Or you’re trying not to. We watch as Trump’s sycophants hack away at the agencies that keep us alive, leaving them bleeding and gasping for air.

This is how they break the spirit of the American people.

To act as if this is just “Trump being Trump” is to underestimate their underlying agenda.

“Can’t you just shoot them? Just shoot them in the legs or something?” Trump to former SECDEF Mark Esper in 2020.

This quote is disturbing, but it’s 2025 and we’re nowhere near the civil unrest of the 2020 Floyd protests—unless they’re able to create it.

The Manufactured Flashpoint

I think about the families in North Carolina—maybe you do too. One storm. One night. And suddenly they’re living under a tarp in the hills, shivering, staring at the mud where their home used to be. They waited for FEMA. They prayed for FEMA. And then came the denial. Trump said no. Just… no. No aid. No lifeline. No reason. Try telling a child huddled beside you that the government of the richest nation on earth just shrugged. DESPAIR.

Or the mother who did everything right—every well-check, every vaccine—until the lies and poison from RFK Jr. made her second-guess what she once trusted. Now she sits beside a hospital bed, watching her child fight a disease we had already beaten. She carries the guilt. Her child carries the consequences. HOPELESSNESS.

Then there are the farmers who voted for Trump with their full chest, now watching as the slashing of USAID and the illogical punitive tariffs decimate their businesses. Meanwhile, Trump handed Argentina a $40 billion bailout, cut a deal to purchase their beef, and in return Argentina struck new agreements to sell soybeans to countries that once bought from U.S. suppliers. All as JD Vance and his AcreTrader investors scour the country for farms on life support, ready to swoop in and rob hardworking American families of what they spent generations building. ANGUISH.

And then there’s the veteran I can’t stop picturing—perhaps because I am one, and this visual occupies space in my brain and heart that I can’t turn off. It’s reality for too many. Trump’s tariffs were supposed to help the economy and the American people; that’s what they were told. Instead, prices exploded. Jobs disappeared. The VA slashed support. Some were hit twice, never realizing that “eliminating DEI” also meant eliminating programs that kept women in the workforce. Now they stare at stacks of bills no one with PTSD should ever have to face. They’re a month away from losing their home, and SNAP benefits are days away from a hold-status until the government reopens.

An unnecessary government shutdown that could have been avoided if Speaker Johnson would just release the Epstein files. They’re confused and crushed. Fox is on in the background, reporting that Trump is building a $300 million ballroom. For who? The billionaires? The oligarchs? RAGE.

Bannon’s Firehose of Maximum Outrage

And now we have the beginnings of the uprising that Putin, Trump, Steve Bannon, the weak-ass tech bros with their pre-built bunkers, and the Project 2025 Nazis have been engineering—by slashing and burning the people’s lifelines.

This is the architecture of despair:

Watching in horror as a corrupt Supreme Court legitimized race as a factor to remove Black and Brown people from our streets.
Knowing that Democrats signed off on the Laken Riley Act with human rights violations baked in—now we question all politicians.
Trump canceling 94 million pounds of food aid to our food banks in the spring.
A looming SNAP halt that will hit over 40 million households, even as a $5 billion surplus sits unused—money we know will not be spent to feed families this Thanksgiving.
Rural schools hurting after DOE cuts, as vouchers go to the wealthy.
Food borne illnesses on the rise as RFK Jr. guts the agencies that protect the public—literally killing people.
The Medicaid cuts we know are coming as the wealthy continue to fiscally rape the working class.
Sexual assault protections rolled back—for women in the military, on college campuses, and in corporations that choose to embrace Trump and Hegseth’s pre–women’s rights mindset.
Military bases renamed after Confederate traitors, using random soldiers with matching names to stoke racial division.
Funding slashed for HBCUs and for health research programs serving Black women—a reminder that no matter the progress, it can always be snatched away. The boot will always be on the neck. There can never be trust. Ever.
Jackie Kennedy’s Rose Garden ripped out for a tacky patio to host criminals and pedophiles.
The East Wing of the people’s White House reduced to rubble for a 90,000-square-foot ballroom for a puny little man who can’t even dance.

He tore down the fucking White House—our White House.

It’s the methodical destruction of our sacred institutions and the places we turn when we are scared, sick, or desperate. It is the breaking of the American spine by men drunk on unearned power, men who enjoy watching people crawl.

And that is why $170 billion to ICE matters. Because once you break people, you need an army to control the pieces. An army they plan to have in place by the spring, before the midterms.

Important Message from Professor Emeritus Dr. James Greenberg

By Connie Wilson

On September 26, 2025

In Editorial, Essays on Politics: Best Political Essays & Ideology

Please read this insightful and informational warning about the Rule of Law and our Justice system, from legal Professor Emeritus, Dr. James Greenberg.

James Greenberg

Justice in America is breaking. Not in its statutes or codes, which still sit on the books, but in the trust that makes them real. Prosecutors are supposed to pursue evidence, not enemies; courts should weigh facts, not loyalties.

LIKE RUSSIA

I used to teach a comparative course in law and development, and the lesson was always the same: once that trust erodes, law becomes theater. That is where we are headed.

The indictment of James Comey, pursued at Donald Trump’s urging, is more than a dispute between two men. It is a battle over whether the American judiciary will remain a neutral arbiter or become an instrument of retribution. Trump wants to transform the Department of Justice from an independent institution into an extension of his will. Comey, who refused to pledge personal loyalty and later confirmed Trump’s pressure to halt the Russia investigation, has become both symbol and target. The revival of charges—earlier dismissed for lack of grounds—cannot be understood outside this political frame.

LEGAL SYSTEM TRUST

In anthropology, the health of a legal system is not measured by its statutes but by the cultural trust that sustains them. That trust is fragile. In the United States it rests on two thin pillars: prosecutorial independence and judicial restraint. Both have been chipped away. When a president demands prosecution of an opponent, classification no longer guarantees fairness. A charge like “false statement” is drained of its meaning and poured into another mold: disloyalty. At that point, the form of justice may still stand, but the substance has gone.

Trump’s strategy is blunt. He shouts his demands in capital letters—“JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!”—as if volume were verdict. In that gesture, accusation and conviction collapse into each other. Common law depends on the wide space between them, the courtroom itself. That space vanishes when the indictment becomes the sentence and trial becomes the spectacle. Whatever the outcome, the charge itself is punishment—and that is the point.

COMEY CASE

Comey’s case is less about old disputes than about rewriting the script of Trump’s presidency. By going after a former FBI director, he signals that defiance itself is criminal. For anyone who studies authoritarian systems, this is a familiar maneuver: law is turned from a shield for citizens into a weapon against them. Trials become ritual performances, staged to demonstrate loyalty and vengeance. The target is not only the accused but everyone watching. (In 2 OLLE classes at the University of Texas in Austin last year this was underscored.)

POLITICAL ECOLOGY

Political ecology offers another lens. Systems are interconnected; stress in one part spreads through the rest. Undermine prosecutorial independence, and the damage doesn’t stop there. It weakens protections for voting rights, environmental rules, labor standards—anything that depends on fair enforcement. Once courts become partisan stages, the whole edifice of governance tilts. Legal categories drift from neutral tools into political weapons. While the system may still use the same words, their meaning is altered.

TRUMP ACCELERATES DECAY

Comparative perspective makes the drift clear. In civil law systems, codification can slow political abuse; in common law systems like ours, reliance on precedent and discretion can adapt, but also bend. Everything depends on norms: restraint, good faith, and independence. Precedent is more than procedure; it is the memory of the system. When Trump revives long-dismissed charges, he severs that chain of memory. Courts stop functioning as repositories of experience. Once that memory is broken, decay accelerates.

ASSAULT ON THE JUDICIARY

Trump’s assault on the judiciary has been steady, cumulative. He has called judges “so-called,” branded rulings as partisan, and accused prosecutors of corruption. Each step chips away at legitimacy. The Comey indictment is another blow: a message that courts and prosecutors are simply tools of politics. Delegitimize the referee, and only loyalty counts; truth dissolves into performance.

The danger is not limited to Comey or to Trump’s direct critics. Once justice shifts from evidence to allegiance, no one is safe. Friends today can be enemies tomorrow. Categories like “traitor” or “enemy” float free from legal definition, ready to be pinned on whoever falls from favor. Anthropologists call this symbolic inversion: rituals meant to guarantee order are turned upside down and used to enforce domination. (*Some interesting reading on this “report your neighbor” stuff in a documentary about the East Berlin police force.)

For ordinary citizens the erosion can be hard to see. Life goes on. Judges still wear robes, hearings still convene. Yet symbols matter. Once the courtroom becomes a theater of power, the public’s ability to tell the difference between real adjudication and political stagecraft fades. Trust—already worn thin—begins to collapse. And fear does the rest. When prosecutors hesitate, when judges weigh not only law but personal risk, when citizens decide silence is safer, the system disciplines itself. Fear spreads like contamination through an ecosystem.

McCARTHY ERA

We have seen this before: the McCarthy hearings, Nixon’s enemies list, the detentions after 9/11. Each twisted law to partisan ends. What makes the present moment different is the breadth and the brazenness. Trump is not content to exploit the judiciary; he wants to redefine it in his image. That is why the Comey indictment matters. It is not a minor skirmish. It is a marker of systemic change.

Anthropology reminds us that law is never only technical. It is always cultural: a mirror of trust and expectation. When those expectations tilt toward vengeance, the entire system tilts with them. Political ecology adds the warning: stressed systems reach tipping points. Just as an ecosystem pushed too far may fail suddenly, a judiciary stripped of trust may not recover. Rules can be rewritten, but trust—once gone—takes generations.

The indictment of Comey is not just about one man or one office. It marks how far the judiciary has been dragged into the theater of loyalty. Trump’s attack on the courts is an attack on the very trust that sustains democracy. Whether that trust endures may decide if democracy itself does.

56th Nashville Film Festival Closing Night Tonight

By Connie Wilson

On September 24, 2025

In Editorial, Movies, News, Pop Culture, travel

“Man on the Run” is a terrific documentary about Paul McCartney’s caarer and life, post Beatles.

Here in Nashville, we could not get the Jimmy Kimmel Show last night (Tuesday, September 23). It was one of the states where station owners refused to carry the program. Very sorry that we were bombarded, instead, with a boring montage of Tennessee historic footage. Couldn’t find Kimmel on my computer, either. Spent most of the night looking for it on various services, to no avail.

We came home from an audience award winning documentary about hunting for pythons in Florida, “The Python Hunt,” excited to see Glen Powell (‘Twisters 2″) as a guest on Jimmy’s return to the air waves. No dice. We were able to see some of the opening monologue and a bit of Glen Powell’s appearance on YouTube today, a day late, but Kimmel’s free speech was curbed and for no good reason. Nothing he said was that inflammatory. This is clearly a case of a wannabe dictator moving the levers of power to become that dictator . It is exactly what Putin did in Russia, limned for us in 2 classes at the University of Texas in Austin during OLLIE classes last year.

Furthermore, DJT is talking about trying a second shake-down of Disney, after a $16 million cave when he threw his presidential weight around last time. How can we stop this? Why isn’t more being done to return our country to a constitutional democracy that guarantees life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and grants us 1st Amendment freedoms that are the envy of the rest of the world? I feel sad today about the new administration’s emphasis on revenge, retribution and hanging onto power by any means necessary. It’s unseemly and illegal and absolutely not the vision the Founding Fathers had for our country. I’m embarrassed by Trump and his remarks at the U.N. yesterday show that there is something very wrong happening, and we need to stop it and restore whatever we can of our dignity and status in the world.

Also, apparently there is some sort of anti-gay or anti-drag movement here in Tennessee (and nationwide) being proposed, much like Russia. One of the movies we saw, “Magic Hour,” had four drag queens making an appearance, including one who recently won an Emmy for make-up and goes by the name of Lusious Massacr.

The celebrity speaker about making indie movies, Jay Duplass of the Duplass Brothers (Mark appears on “The Morning Show” and won the supporting actor Emmy for his role), was in town, so I had high hopes that he would stop by the Q&A for his sister-in-law’s movie, “Magic Hour,” but that didn’t happen.

I did sit through the movie and am working up Director Katie Aselton’s remarks on the changing nature of indie film-making in a streaming world. The same might be said of the publishing world, which has changed substantially since my first book came out about 13 years ago. (Not counting the publication of “Training the Teacher As A Champion” by Performance Learning Systems, Inc,, some years earlier, their company Bible.) Very recently, I had an SEO expert tell me that A.I, would put all bloggers out of business, so there’s that to consider, also, and one reason I try to work in a personal detail or two that only a human would know or have.

I continue to inject an opinion that obviously came from a human, just to make sure that the bots don’t take over the world, so be prepared.

Closing night film, “Kiss of the Spider Woman” at the Belcourt Theater tonight. Jennifer Lopez is in it, but is not here tonight. Nicole Kidman spoke on Sunday, but that got past me, as it sold out in less than a day and I did not get the notice (of Aug. 29) until Aug. 31st. I’ve not seen a thing about her remarks.

One cast member is supposed to appear tonight. Maybe I’ll make an After Party tonight, my first.

Mother Jones & Union Activism in the U.S.

By Connie Wilson

On September 16, 2025

In Editorial, Education, Local, News, Of Local (Quad Cities') Interest, Politics

Activist and organizer Mother Jones.

We’re on the way to the 56th Nashville Film Festival. Driving 7 hours to Paducah, Kentucky was the start.

On the way, we stopped at a rest stop in Southern Illinois, where I communed with Mother Jones, patron saint of the magazine for the reasons you can read here for yourself. Mother Jones was a union organizer and activist. So was I. Mother Jones formed the United Mine Workers, hoping to stop the exploitation of underage minersand the habit of taking advantage of immigrant labor that still exists.

I led the 3-year charge to unionize (organize) the SEA (Silvis Education Association) and I worked hard and long, as, I’m sure, Mother Jones did. My efforts were once scorned by a dinner partner who tried to assign malign characteristics to unions, when, in fact, they are one of the reasons that American workers began to be paid a living wage and treated fairly. This particular critic didn’t like the NEA (National Education Association) and was a white male who was, no doubt, during his working years, a managerial type.

Union Organizing by Mother Jones

When I started teaching in Silvis, Illinois, in 1969 unions were the farthest thing from my mind. We had an education association, which was basically a milk-and-cookies type after-school meeting with no power at all. There had been no recognition of the organization as representing the teachers who taught in Silvis, who numbered about 50 souls in grades K through 8. The SEA had been in existence since 1962, a time period when I was still in high school.

It wasn’t until at least 10 years after my employment began in Silvis that I became aware of the fact that every other school district around us had representatives who sat down with the school board to discuss issues like salary, class size, and work hours, while we had nothing. We read our new year’s salary in the newspaper and it rarely went up. I started teaching in Silvis for $5,280 a year and, out of that, paid for pre-school supervision for my then-one-year-old son. If you think that sounds like a paltry sum for working a full year, you are right.

In defense of the hair do that looks like it was beaten by an egg-beater, I had my sun glasses on top of my head until a few moments before this picture was taken.

I remember saying, to our then-principal, “They should never have rattled my cage,” which had to do with the administration taking my one day of personal leave when my son was hospitalized with double pneumonia and I was told to go right to the hospital from work. I was gone one day. The district took advantage of my necessary absence due to the ill health of my then 2-year-old son, showing absolutely no sympathy to the first-year teacher. (I remember being asked, “Is he going to die?” to justify leaving after I got the call that he was in the emergency room.)

So, I began finding out what it took to unionize our milk-and-cookies organization. It would require a vote supervised by the League of Women Voters and the next 3 years were a blur of finding out how to achieve this. The days of a powerless organization that had no discussion rights with the administration and had to content itself with reading next year’s salary in the local newspaper were gone.

It took me three years of P.R. efforts and going door-to-door in the Silvis neighborhoods, while my two best friends, Linda and Judy went off to Egypt and rode camels during Easter break. But not me. I worked on finding out how to get our group recognized by a recalcitrant school board and administration for 3 years and later was asked to lead workshops elsewhere by the IEA (Illinois Education Association) because we chose to run three candidates at once rather than do the “bullet voting” that the IEA recommended. I defended myself against dogs that ate the buttons off my coat and endured teetering on the brink of blasted-out concrete porches (no idea why the center portion of one house’s porch looked like it had been Ground Zero for an explosion, but it did).

We won the vote and, as far as I am aware, the Silvis Education Association still has negotiating rights with the Silvis School Board. In order to get that right, our organization had to interview and then back new candidates for the school board. We campaigned for our endorsed candidates, whom we interviewed at the local library, and put up billboards. I organized a phone tree to contact local voters. We won, but it took three years of work. We elected four members of a seven member board. Unlike DJT, we were not out for revenge. We just wanted what every other school district’s employees had: collective bargaining rights.

That is what Mother Jones helped miners to achieve and I’d recommend reading what the rest stop monument informed us about her life and achievements.

I may not have single-handedly made Silvis teachers rich (or rich-er), but we established a Sick Leave Bank into which employees could contribute a day (or more) of their unusued sick leave towards someone with a catastrophic illness. I know that it came in handy for Marion Gray when she was out a lengthy period recovering from a mastectomy. We were able to secure some other benefits for the underpaid Silvis employees, and, most importantly, we opened the door to the SEA being treated as a representative organization for future teachers in the Silvis School District.

And that’s your history lesson for the day.

Jolie Eden as Thuy Nguyen in the short "Little Bird" at the HollyShorts Film Festival.

“Little Bird” & “The Stand” At HollyShorts Film Festival

By Connie Wilson

On August 15, 2025

In Editorial, Movies, Reviews

Jolie Eden as Thuy Nguyen in “Little Bird” at the HollyShorts Film Festival.

Vietnamese filmmaker and AFI Conservatory MFA Graduate Oanh-Nhi Nguyen is the only filmmaker to have two films accepted into the HollyShorts Film Festival, taking place August 7-17^th in Hollywood, California, “Little Bird” and “The Stand.” Oanh-Nhi Nguyen collaborated on writing the screenplay with Ysabeaux Ng. Timothy Shin was the cinematographer.

Nguyen’s goal is to examine Southeast Asian refugees and other immigrant groups with her two films, “The Stand” and “Little Bird.” The shorts run only roughly 15 minutes, but those 15 minutes are aimed at dehumanizing ethnic groups that the Writer/Director says have been “invisibilized.” She notes: “In the current times we live in, immigrants are seen as criminals.”

“Little Bird” was my favorite of the two of these excellent shorts, primarily because of the luminous performance of the Vietnamese child Thuy Nguyen, played so genuinely and touchingly by Jolie Eden. What a find! She is a charming and beautiful child actress.

Jolie Edens as Thuy Nguyen in “The Stand” at the HollyShorts Film Festival (Aug. 7-17).

In the story, she and many others have been living in slumlord Mr. Chou’s (Perry Yung’s) squalid apartment with numerous other immigrant families for 8 and ½ months. She is also separated temporarily from her parents. The large group in the horrible apartment is 4 weeks behind on the rent. Mr. Chou also wants to raise the rent by $120 and ignores their pleas to fix the many broken things.

The eviction lady who works for Mr. Chou, Linh Tran (Chantal Thuy), has been sent to distribute eviction notices in 1980 Los Angeles, right after the Vietnam War ended. Little Thuy is living there with relatives (but not her parents) and, touchingly, invites the eviction lady to join them for soup.

Linh Tran is invited into the crowded apartment because of confusion over who she is. The residents think she is the Chinese American housing organizer (Debbie Wei) . Real-life efforts to help the immigrants organize a rent strike in Philadelphia inspired the message of compassion and empathy that this much-honored Vietnamese filmmaker memorializes with this short.

Linh (Chantal Thuy) attempts to intercede with the disinterested landlord Mr. Chou, who urges her to go back out and evict more, saying, ‘Do your job or I’ll find someone else who will.” Ultimately, Linh’s humanity and sense of righteousness and fairness lead to her aiding the group. One male member of the many in the apartment says, ‘We have a roof over our heads. Isn’t that enough?” five minutes into the film. No, it is not, and little Thuy expresses her hope that she can remain in this home away from her homeland.

Because Linh Tran works for Mr. Chou, she knows that he is behind on filing the necessary paperwork and is in breach of agreements, as the reports are a year old. Linh shares this information and a rent strike is organized. The ultimate conclusion is optimistic for the immigrants. If only the outlook were this positive for all immigrant communities in the United States.

AUTHENTIC TOUCHES

There are many authentic touches in this film, which was part of Writer/Director Oanh-Nhi Nguyen’s work in 2024 for the American Film Institute for her MFA. She knows this cultural territory and utilizes references to delicacies like che ha mau, which is a three-color dessert. The music and song (Co Nho Dem Nao) by Khanh Bang, performed by Phuong Tam is also utilized to good effect and the actors “dance like crazy monkeys” (a scripted line.)

But the very best thing in this film, captured well by Cinematographer Timothy Shin is the little girl Thuy (Jolie Eden) and her interaction with Linh Tran (Chantal Thuy), both of whom do a great job in their roles.

Bravo!

“THE STAND”

“The Stand” at the HollyShorts Film Festival, Aug. 7-17th.

The second short by Oanh-Nhi Nguyen at HollyShorts is “The Stand.” Nguyen wrote this one with Corey Pinchoff and Ace Wang edited the cinematography by Ed Wiu.

The stars of “The Stand” are Jovie Leigh and Kailen Jude. Again, there are so many awards that the short has already won (over 10) that this review would be filled simply by listing them all.

Suffice it to say that Jovie Leigh, a Filipino actress who won as the Best Young Actress Award for 2023 from Hollywood Film Festival, is great as the lead, the daughter of a divorced Mom who depends on running a stand that sells skewers of pork and chicken for money.

Young Quinn has just been selected for a solo at the school concert, and she wants her mother to be able to attend, but the concert falls on one of the busiest times for the stand, so Mom is unsure that she is going to be able to go. Add to that the change in a court appearance (dispute over child support payments) that causes Mom to leave the stand in the command of her high school aged daughter (Jovie Leigh as Quinn), who is also to supervise her little brother Liam (Kailen Jude). Things do not go as smoothly as Mom hoped, but the denouement of this short is positive.

I was impressed to learn that the young Kailen has appeared in the M. Night Shymalan film “Old” and also has had appearances alongside celebrities like John Stamos and Sharon Stone. He is only about ten years old but has been working since age three. The entire effect of the 16:44 minute short was to mark Oanh-Nhi Nguyen as a promising young director with a great future ahead of her in the world of film.

Both shorts have important messages for us all.

The feeling I had as the two shorts ended was, “Long live Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. And good luck to this promising young AFI Film School graduate.” I couldn’t help but ask,“What can we do, as a country, to rid ourselves of those who would persecute and prosecute and victimize immigrants, people who are simply seeking a better life for their families and are the life blood of our melting pot of a country?”

Congratulations to this bright young Vietnamese filmmaker for making us all more aware of our need to try to be good people to immigrants of all countries who come to America.

Kyle Langford Poses Outside Auschwitz in GOP Run for California Governor

By Connie Wilson

On August 13, 2025

In Editorial, Essays on Politics: Best Political Essays & Ideology

Did Kyle Langford, a Republican candidate for governor of California, post a photo of himself in front of Auschwitz as an advertisement for “My 0% unemployment Plan.” Yahoo fact checked it and here’s the truth:]