Author Archives: Alan O’Hashi, Whole Brain Thinker

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About Alan O’Hashi, Whole Brain Thinker

I’ve been involved with community journalism since 1968 when I wrote for my junior school paper, the "Tumbleweed," through high school and college and then wrote for the "Wyoming State Journal." I put aside my newspaper pen and began Boulder Community Media in 2005. There wasn’t much community journalism opportunity, so I resurrected my writing career as a screenwriter. My first short screenplay, “Stardust”, won an award in the 2005 Denver Screenwriting Center contest. I've made a number of movies over the years. Filmmaking is time-consuming, labor and equipment intensive. I recently changed my workflow to first write a book and make a movie based on that content. - Electric Vehicle Anxiety and Advice - This is a memoir travelogue of three trips covering 2,600 EV miles around Wyoming (2022) - Beyond Heart Mountain - Winter Goose Publishers released my memoir in February (2022) - The Zen of Writing with Confidence and Imperfection - This is a book recounting how luck planed into my signing a book deal after a 15-minute pitch meeting. (2020) - True Stories of an Aging Baby Boomer - War stories about living in a cohousing and lessons others can learn when starting their communities (2021) - Beyond Sand Creek - About Arapaho tribal efforts to repatriate land in Colorado (PBS - TBA) - Beyond Heart Mountain - Based on my memoir about my childhood in Cheyenne facing overt and subtle racism toward the Japanese following World War II (PBS - 2021) - New Deal Artist Public Art Legacy - About artists who created work in Wyoming during the Great Depression (PBS - 2018) - Mahjong and the West - SAG indie feature which premiered at the semi-important Woodstock Film Festival (2014) Over the years, I’ve produced directed, filmed and/or edited several short movies, “Running Horses” (Runner Up – Wyoming Short Film Contest), “On the Trail: Jack Kerouac in Cheyenne” (Lowell Celebrates Kerouac Festival, Top 10 Wyoming Short Film Contest), “Gold Digger” (Boulder Asian Film Festival), “Adobo” (Boulder International Film Festival), “A Little Bit of Discipline” (Rosebud Film Series), and two feature length documentaries “Your Neighbor’s Child” (Wyoming PBS and Rocky Mountain PBS), and “Serotonin Rising” (American Film Market, Vail Film Festival). He also directed and produced the award winning stage play “Webster Street Blues” by my childhood friend Warren Kubota. Boulder Community Media is a non-profit production company dedicated to democratzing media in all their forms - large and small screens, printed page and stage by providing sustainable and community-based content. I mostly work with community-based media producers, organizations, and socially-responsible businesses to develop their content via – the written word, electronic and new media, the visual and performing arts in a culturally competent manner – I’m what’s commonly called a niche TV and movie producer. Along with all this is plying my forte’ – fund development through grant writing, sponsorship nurturing and event planning.

Combat Merry Christmas Season: Tips to Beat MCS This Holiday

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It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas… city sidewalks, busy sidewalks, dressed in holiday style… deck the halls… Yes, the hustle and bustle of the festive season is upon us once again.

One of the town’s radio stations has been blaring holiday music for weeks. iPhone Christmas playlists are on repeat.

The pleasant aromas of fruitcakes and mince meat pies drifting from grandma’s house add to the yuletide atmosphere.

Norman Rockwellian scenes appear as woolen-clad youngsters anxiously peer into candy store windows while the tintinnabulation of the Salvation Army Santa bells rings in the background.

Although the times are filled with happiness and joy, many are stricken by a serious condition known as Merry Christmas Season — MCS, the crippler of young adults.

You may be stricken by MCS if you get in a fight on Black Friday.
You may be stricken by MCS if you get in a fight on Black Friday.

MCS is caused by receiving 10 or more LL Bean catalogs a week before election day and overexposure to large doses of Christmas decorations during Thanksgiving week.

Early diagnosis will rid the population of this dreaded affliction. To combat the spread of MCS, the American Merry Christmas Season Association has issued these four warning signals:

1. Coughing or shortness of breath while running across the store to take advantage of the pre-Black Friday X-Box special. This symptom reveals a decline in the stamina needed to put tinsel on the tree one strand at a time, not in clumps of 10 or more. Although this respiratory ailment may be caused by an allergic reaction to mistletoe or mulled wine, it’s best to get checked out.

2. The presence of a lump in your throat or elsewhere when a Craftsman Max Access Power Wrench, the Personal Pedi, or some other gift advertisement with the personal touch pops up on your Facebook feed. If you can’t resist, hurry out and buy an iPad, or the equivalent. If you don’t have that kind of cash, go on Wheel of Fortune and buy a vowel.

3. An eyesore that does not heal after you have decorated your home with more flashing lights than Caesar’s Palace, hired a troupe of actors to depict the Nativity and enticed reindeer into your yard with salt blocks. To aid the rehabilitation process, have a winter garage sale and sell your house and garage.

4. A change in shopping or mail habits noticed when you’re sending out 500 Christmas cards to take advantage of bulk postage rates. After you buy your plump butterball turkey, did you ask the clerk to wrap it in something suitable for a five-year-old? Chronic signs could be developing.

If any of these warning signs persist more than a week after Veterans Day, see your counselor. MCS strikes 1 out of 3 people. Think of your two closest friends, and if they seem okay, then it must be you!

Remember the American Merry Christmas Association this holiday season, and give early and often to maximize IRS tax benefits.

On grand juries, police image problems and revolution

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There’s been quiwizard id peasantste a bit of buzz in the popular media about the recent work of grand juries that found little probable cause to indict police officers who killed citizens in the line of duty.

I have a unique perspective on this having served on a grand jury in a past life.

Grand juries haven’t changed much over the centuries. The idea is to provide yet another control on the government for community members to keep over zealous government lawyers in check. That didn’t happen in Ferguson and Staten Island. The grand jury system was used for political cover.

In the US, the justice system is set up to favor citizens, you know – “innocent until proven guilty.” The burden of proof is on the government to provide probable cause that a crime exists. Grand juries make “probable cause” determinations via indictment. The jury that I sat, heard its fair share of bad cases, in fact, we kept asking for more information if it was lacking. We would advise the cops and county attorney what they needed to bring to strengthen their case. In Ferguson and Staten Island, those juries were actually tasked – by design or by accident, I don’t know – to find the defendants innocent.

How the DA handled these grand jury cases has been fodder for talking heads on both ends of the political spectrum. But the bottom line is, based on the information provided to them, grand jurors had no choice but to find no probable cause. In Staten Island and Ferguson, the jurors were given the prosecution’s evidence and the defense evidence. All that evidence is compounded by the great leeway cops have to show force.

Cops maim and kill people every day but these two cases in particular have raised public awareness about how the citizenry has allowed law enforcement to run amok. I get the public safety thing, but for instance, the other day I was in Loveland at the museum taking a peak at the Georgia O’Keeffe exhibit there. Sitting on a bench was a guy – probably a homeless guy – being questioned by one cop, then another pulled up and joined in on the fun. He was standing back watching.

What went through my mind was, why were they hassling this guy?  The police show of force in this case was placing their hands on their hips in front of their weapons. The next show of force move would have been unsnapping their holsters.

Cops have an image problem.

It’s been happening for generations. It’s pretty much a thankless job – the cop’s job description is looking for trouble and they have guns. I’d be scared, too, if I had to walk into a domestic violence situation not knowing how wigged out a guy might be. (70 to 80 percent of DV perps are men).

Being scared and that coupled with preconceived fears about people based on stereotypes add to the over reaction.  I’m pretty sure the vast majority of cops don’t find themselves in life and death situations or try to avoid them.

Public agencies do the best they can to screen out the real bad apples through psychological screening, but those tests need to to be tweaked to better control for attitudes about race, gender identity.

Sure, Brown was stealing cigars and Garner selling loose cigarettes and not collecting taxes, but the problem is with cops escalating minor criminal situations that end up with people shot.

I hope there continue to be public outcries about this from kids marching out of school, and communities taking it to the streets. It’s the only way for victims to get the political system to react.

It’s going to take awhile for things to change. Keep in mind it’s only been 150 years since Lincoln’s emancipation proclamation and 50 years since the Civil Rights Act was signed into law.

There’s no turning back.

Apres campaign 2014 – Democrats are their own worst enemies

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The 2014 midterm election cycle was a Throwback Tuesday to the 2004 presidential election. The Democrats blew it with their finesse game. The Republicans are way better at campaigning using brute force and they have way more money.

The big quasi surprise was Mark Udall getting defeated. I think it was largely at his own hand. His ground game wasn’t good enough. I think if he had Obama come to Denver and Boulder, that would have been positive for him. Nationally, the Democrats bought into the Republican anti-Obama story. Instead of staying home, president should have been been out there making whistle stops. I don’t care what anyone says, when the President of the US shows up it is a BFD!

I wait until election day to turn in my vote.

I wait until election day to turn in my vote.

Udall let Gardner position his campaign as single issue, which it wasn’t. Udall originally was elected because of his name. He was a political carpetbagger when he first came to Boulder and ran for the U.S. House. Gardner did a good job framing Udall as a career politician with no heart.

Gardner played the “grandma card” and the “tractor card” which both played well. Plus he was only joshing about his past personhood and anti-women views. Udall didn’t show any emotion. He followed the Gore and Kerry playbooks which talked about data and votes and little about his story and about his vision for the country.

I did see a blog post on his campaign site about he being a kid in the southwest, but that didn’t do anything to show him “in touch” with Colorado. Same thing happened to John Kerry when Bush shaped the election and Kerry just followed along with being painted as a rich kid and a swift boater.

The Bill and Hillary road show helped close the gap for Udall, but their star power is fading. The Clintons showed up in Kentucky many times but Alison Grimes was thoroughly stomped there by Mitch McConnell.

Hickenlooper eked one out. That should be a wake up call. He tried to keep everyone happy, but ended up ticking everyone off. Bob Beauprez playing the “mass murderer” card backfired. I imagine families in Colorado would feel safer without edible marijuana on the market. Both Ways Bob is a sore loser and likely waiting for a recount before conceding.

Meanwhile, in Wyoming – the Republicans held serve. The state legislature lost a Democrat in Lee Filer from Cheyenne, but picked up Charles Pelky from Laramie. I think the mix in the Wyoming State House of Representatives is 51 Red to 9 Blue. The Democratic Party in Wyoming doesn’t have a candidate grooming strategy.  The Tea Party, on the other hand, is good at making all politics local by getting their folks to get on city parks boards and planning commissions. In Jefferson County, Colorado, the conservative majority members of the school board were sneaked in there and nobody really noticed until the recent flap over the move towards revisionist history.

In Wyoming, if a person gets elected to any office or appointed to a board or commission, it makes them immediately available for other elective offices. Former Mayor turned State Legislator Del McOmie at out a cycle or two and was elected as mayor Lander for his second go-around. He’s thoughtful and asks around before he makes decisions. When I worked for him it was during some tough times – the U.S. Steel mine closed, the bottom dropped out of the uranium market just after the 3-Mile Island meltdown. I hope he resurfaces in statewide politics again.

Senate Majority Leader In Waiting Mitch McConnell has been talking big after the election and it doesn’t sound like there will be any conciliatory offers. He’s already threatening Obama on immigration reform. Working with the Democrats, according to McConnell, is total capitulation to the GOP perspective. I don’t see much happening in the next two years. I doubt there will be any meaningful conference committees unless a bunch of Republicans break ranks – which is what happened when the Democrats had control of both houses. Not much got done when congress was controlled by Democrats either.

I can hardly wait until 2016 to hear about why Hillary and Jeb both are too extreme for my own good.