10 thoughts on “Is the Two-Party System in Puerto Rico causing the political stagnation of the island as it is in the U.S.?”
http://WWW.INDEPENDENCIA.NET
To learn more about an alternative to the major force challenging Puerto Rico’s two main political parties, please visit the following web-site:
Some reflections and please answer topic
Rather than just post this FYI–which is appreciated, I request that you also respond to the topic. I, for one, am exploring what the question means–not having given it much thought in these terms: The inability to resolve the sovereignty issue of Puerto Rico, better but incorrectly known as the status question, may be the direct result of this bipolar or two party structure which really makes other views marginal, financially, historically, politically, socially and ideologically. How well would Nationalists, independentistas and Green Party members fair in a parliamentary system? It certainly would add legitimacy and bargaining power. I don’t know. I need to give this more thought. It certainly would seem more democratic in a parliamentary form of government.
please try to address question
The first posting was a reply to this one. Sorry for the confusion.
Puerto Rican Director
Filmmaker Was Obscure, but Not Dead
By SARAH KERSHAW
Some would consider the Puerto Rican filmmaker Tony Felton an obscure cinematic figure. But his admirers —
Spanish-language movie buffs and historians — thought he was dead.
So, for about the last week, Mr.
Felton, a once-prominent pioneer of
Puerto Rican cinema, found himself
in the unusual position of conversing with people who expressed amazement at his very existence.
It all started when he spoke to the
director of a nonprofit agency in the
Bronx to inquire about renting a
theater to screen some of his films. To his surprise, the agency director
recognized his name and said he had been trying to track him down.
“Felton, Felton,” Mr. Felton recalled the man saying. “Are you Felton? We’ve been looking for you. I thought you were dead.”
Then he spoke to Roberto Ramos- Perea, the director of the film recovery
and preservation program of Ateneo Puertorriqueño, a nonprofit film
institute in Puerto Rico. Mr. Ramos-Perea initially thought he was talking to a ghost, Mr. Felton said.
Mr. Felton also spoke to officials from the office of the Bronx borough
president, Fernando Ferrer, who had been tipped off last Thursday about Mr. Felton’s whereabouts by a Philadelphia woman who had heard about a film festival featuring long-lost Puerto Rican movie classics. The woman,
who would not identify herself, had hoped that some of Mr. Felton’s films
might be included in the festival, which began last night at Hostos Community College in the Bronx. (Maybe next year.)
People in Mr. Ferrer’s office were familiar with Mr. Felton’s work, but
they had also assumed he was dead.
But as it turns out, Mr. Felton, 59, has lived in a two-story white house on
Washington Avenue in the Tremont section of the Bronx since 1996. He lives with Luis Arroyo, 58, the leading man in several of his films and a collaborator with him on almost two dozen other movies, most shot on location in Puerto Rico. Both men’s telephone numbers are listed.
“We are still alive, very much alive,” Mr. Arroyo said yesterday during an
interview in his living room. Propped against a wall was a framed poster of
“El Rebelde Solitario, la historia de Enrique Blanco” (“Lonely Rebel:
Enrique Blanco’s Story”), a 1972 film directed by Mr. Felton and starring
Mr. Arroyo.
Mr. Felton and Mr. Arroyo made 23 films, all of them in Spanish and about
Puerto Ricans, and most of them based on true stories. Their biggest hit,”Correa Cotto, Así Me Llaman,” (“Correa Cotto, That’s My Name”) was directed by Mr. Felton and starred Mr. Arroyo. The film was released in 1969 in New York and other American cities and was a major box office success for the Spanish-language cinema in this country. It was based on the story of a notorious Puerto Rican criminal of the 1940’s and 1950’s.
Neither Mr. Felton nor Mr. Arroyo has made a film since 1978, and several of their films have disappeared because they were distributed by film companies that have gone out of business.
Mr. Felton said that, in addition to making his own films, he had acquired
about 100 other Puerto Rican films and distributed some of them in the 1960’s and 1970’s. He is now working with Mr. Ramos-Perea to find 30 of those films that are missing, along with four of his own missing works, and send them to Puerto Rico.
As Mr. Felton and Mr. Arroyo tend to all the telephone calls and tasks prompted by their recent rediscovery, they are also working on their first film in more than two decades, an English-language feature about the life of the much-revered salsa singer Hector Lavoe, who died in 1993.
Mr. Felton said he did not want to disclose the movie’s title. “We’re like
Woody Allen,” he said. “We don’t want to give it away yet. We’re going to keep everyone in suspense.”
would like info on history of PR political parties
i would like to have some information about the different parties in Puerto Rico, their histories and if in fact there is a two-party system.
Hoping this doesn’t sound too ignorant
Why would a two-party system necessarily result in stagnation? The assumption here seems to be that if the Puerto Rican people are not able to come to a decision on sovereignty in their minds, it is the fault of the system. Why isn’t it their fault or their inability to come to terms with their condition?
Now that PNP is gone
Now that the PNP is gone and PPD has replaced them and PIP got what it always gets–approximately 4%. What did we achieve, beyond a flipflop? For one, the PPD for strategic reasons, I believe, sided with the Viequenses and was able to capture the vote. Still, in reaction to the PNP, that is, they weren’t presenting a vision for Puerto Rico but just another form of accomodation that would allow them to come to power and send their rival PNP packing. Why should these two parties be the official ones? Who said so?
I thought you would like to know that the PIP’s Governor candidate, Ruben Berrios, got 5.2%, not 4%. The PIP obtained aproximately 105,000 which represents an 80% growth rate, compared to the votes obtained in the 1996 election were the PIP obtained aprox.
75,000 votes. Fernando Martin, candidate for the Senate finished first in the race obtaining 210,000 votes (about 11% of the total vote) and Representative candidate finished firs in the at-large-Representative race, obtaining about 215,000 votes (11% of the total vote).
Puerto Rico mayor arrested on corruption charge
Puerto Rico mayor arrested on corruption charges
December 21, 2000
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Authorities have arrested a small-town mayor on federal charges of extortion and soliciting kickbacks, the latest in a wave of corruption cases in Puerto Rico.
A federal grand jury indicted Liborio Ruben Caro Muniz, mayor of the west coast town of Rincon, on two counts of extortion and six of receiving kickbacks from a contractor in exchange for projects. Federal prosecutor Guillermo Gil announced the indictment at a Wednesday news conference in the capital of this U.S. Caribbean territory.
Officers arrested Caro Muniz at his home Wednesday morning and brought him to the U.S. District Court for Puerto Rico in San Juan. He pleaded innocent, and Magistrate Aida Delgado released him on $100,000 bond. “I’m not guilty,” Caro Muniz told reporters as he left the
court. “This is an accusation that’s on paper there, but I have to study it to see what it is they’re saying about me.
This morning they arrested me and brought me here without giving me documents or anything.” Gil compared the case to that of former Toa Alta mayor Angel $2.5 million in kickbacks for a federally funded cleanup contract after hurricane Georges in 1998.
“It’s the same type of behavior that disgracefully is almost a custom in our country in which many public officials
demand payment of kickbacks to authorize contracts,” Gil said.
The indictment alleges that Caro Muniz was asking a contractor for $20,000 worth of kickbacks to award the company two contracts — one to rezone municipal land and another to design a lighting system for a sports stadium.
http://WWW.INDEPENDENCIA.NET
To learn more about an alternative to the major force challenging Puerto Rico’s two main political parties, please visit the following web-site:
http://www.independencia.net
Regards,
Hans Perl-Matanzo
Some reflections and please answer topic
Rather than just post this FYI–which is appreciated, I request that you also respond to the topic. I, for one, am exploring what the question means–not having given it much thought in these terms: The inability to resolve the sovereignty issue of Puerto Rico, better but incorrectly known as the status question, may be the direct result of this bipolar or two party structure which really makes other views marginal, financially, historically, politically, socially and ideologically. How well would Nationalists, independentistas and Green Party members fair in a parliamentary system? It certainly would add legitimacy and bargaining power. I don’t know. I need to give this more thought. It certainly would seem more democratic in a parliamentary form of government.
please try to address question
The first posting was a reply to this one. Sorry for the confusion.
Puerto Rican Director
Filmmaker Was Obscure, but Not Dead
By SARAH KERSHAW
Some would consider the Puerto Rican filmmaker Tony Felton an obscure cinematic figure. But his admirers —
Spanish-language movie buffs and historians — thought he was dead.
So, for about the last week, Mr.
Felton, a once-prominent pioneer of
Puerto Rican cinema, found himself
in the unusual position of conversing with people who expressed amazement at his very existence.
It all started when he spoke to the
director of a nonprofit agency in the
Bronx to inquire about renting a
theater to screen some of his films. To his surprise, the agency director
recognized his name and said he had been trying to track him down.
“Felton, Felton,” Mr. Felton recalled the man saying. “Are you Felton? We’ve been looking for you. I thought you were dead.”
Then he spoke to Roberto Ramos- Perea, the director of the film recovery
and preservation program of Ateneo Puertorriqueño, a nonprofit film
institute in Puerto Rico. Mr. Ramos-Perea initially thought he was talking to a ghost, Mr. Felton said.
Mr. Felton also spoke to officials from the office of the Bronx borough
president, Fernando Ferrer, who had been tipped off last Thursday about Mr. Felton’s whereabouts by a Philadelphia woman who had heard about a film festival featuring long-lost Puerto Rican movie classics. The woman,
who would not identify herself, had hoped that some of Mr. Felton’s films
might be included in the festival, which began last night at Hostos Community College in the Bronx. (Maybe next year.)
People in Mr. Ferrer’s office were familiar with Mr. Felton’s work, but
they had also assumed he was dead.
But as it turns out, Mr. Felton, 59, has lived in a two-story white house on
Washington Avenue in the Tremont section of the Bronx since 1996. He lives with Luis Arroyo, 58, the leading man in several of his films and a collaborator with him on almost two dozen other movies, most shot on location in Puerto Rico. Both men’s telephone numbers are listed.
“We are still alive, very much alive,” Mr. Arroyo said yesterday during an
interview in his living room. Propped against a wall was a framed poster of
“El Rebelde Solitario, la historia de Enrique Blanco” (“Lonely Rebel:
Enrique Blanco’s Story”), a 1972 film directed by Mr. Felton and starring
Mr. Arroyo.
Mr. Felton and Mr. Arroyo made 23 films, all of them in Spanish and about
Puerto Ricans, and most of them based on true stories. Their biggest hit,”Correa Cotto, Así Me Llaman,” (“Correa Cotto, That’s My Name”) was directed by Mr. Felton and starred Mr. Arroyo. The film was released in 1969 in New York and other American cities and was a major box office success for the Spanish-language cinema in this country. It was based on the story of a notorious Puerto Rican criminal of the 1940’s and 1950’s.
Neither Mr. Felton nor Mr. Arroyo has made a film since 1978, and several of their films have disappeared because they were distributed by film companies that have gone out of business.
Mr. Felton said that, in addition to making his own films, he had acquired
about 100 other Puerto Rican films and distributed some of them in the 1960’s and 1970’s. He is now working with Mr. Ramos-Perea to find 30 of those films that are missing, along with four of his own missing works, and send them to Puerto Rico.
As Mr. Felton and Mr. Arroyo tend to all the telephone calls and tasks prompted by their recent rediscovery, they are also working on their first film in more than two decades, an English-language feature about the life of the much-revered salsa singer Hector Lavoe, who died in 1993.
Mr. Felton said he did not want to disclose the movie’s title. “We’re like
Woody Allen,” he said. “We don’t want to give it away yet. We’re going to keep everyone in suspense.”
would like info on history of PR political parties
i would like to have some information about the different parties in Puerto Rico, their histories and if in fact there is a two-party system.
Hoping this doesn’t sound too ignorant
Why would a two-party system necessarily result in stagnation? The assumption here seems to be that if the Puerto Rican people are not able to come to a decision on sovereignty in their minds, it is the fault of the system. Why isn’t it their fault or their inability to come to terms with their condition?
Now that PNP is gone
Now that the PNP is gone and PPD has replaced them and PIP got what it always gets–approximately 4%. What did we achieve, beyond a flipflop? For one, the PPD for strategic reasons, I believe, sided with the Viequenses and was able to capture the vote. Still, in reaction to the PNP, that is, they weren’t presenting a vision for Puerto Rico but just another form of accomodation that would allow them to come to power and send their rival PNP packing. Why should these two parties be the official ones? Who said so?
http://www.independencia.net
Dear Eric,
For information about the history of the Puerto Rican Independence Party (PIP), you should read Fernando Martin’s book: La Tierra Prometida.
You can e-mail me atmatanzo@independencia.net for information about how to obtain the book. Also, you can visit the web-site
http://www.independencia.net for more information about the Puerto Rican Independence Party.
In solidarity,
Hans Perl-Matanzo
Co-Moderator
http://www.independencia.net
PIP got 5%
K Smit:
I thought you would like to know that the PIP’s Governor candidate, Ruben Berrios, got 5.2%, not 4%. The PIP obtained aproximately 105,000 which represents an 80% growth rate, compared to the votes obtained in the 1996 election were the PIP obtained aprox.
75,000 votes. Fernando Martin, candidate for the Senate finished first in the race obtaining 210,000 votes (about 11% of the total vote) and Representative candidate finished firs in the at-large-Representative race, obtaining about 215,000 votes (11% of the total vote).
Puerto Rico mayor arrested on corruption charge
Puerto Rico mayor arrested on corruption charges
December 21, 2000
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Authorities have arrested a small-town mayor on federal charges of extortion and soliciting kickbacks, the latest in a wave of corruption cases in Puerto Rico.
A federal grand jury indicted Liborio Ruben Caro Muniz, mayor of the west coast town of Rincon, on two counts of extortion and six of receiving kickbacks from a contractor in exchange for projects. Federal prosecutor Guillermo Gil announced the indictment at a Wednesday news conference in the capital of this U.S. Caribbean territory.
Officers arrested Caro Muniz at his home Wednesday morning and brought him to the U.S. District Court for Puerto Rico in San Juan. He pleaded innocent, and Magistrate Aida Delgado released him on $100,000 bond. “I’m not guilty,” Caro Muniz told reporters as he left the
court. “This is an accusation that’s on paper there, but I have to study it to see what it is they’re saying about me.
This morning they arrested me and brought me here without giving me documents or anything.” Gil compared the case to that of former Toa Alta mayor Angel $2.5 million in kickbacks for a federally funded cleanup contract after hurricane Georges in 1998.
“It’s the same type of behavior that disgracefully is almost a custom in our country in which many public officials
demand payment of kickbacks to authorize contracts,” Gil said.
The indictment alleges that Caro Muniz was asking a contractor for $20,000 worth of kickbacks to award the company two contracts — one to rezone municipal land and another to design a lighting system for a sports stadium.