Welcome to what the F is going on in Latin America and the Caribbean. A popular resistance broadcast of hot news out of the region. In partnership with Black Alliance for Peace, Haiti America's team, Code Pink, Common Frontiers, Council on Hemispheric Affairs, Friends of Latin America, Interreligious Task Force on Central America, Massachusetts Peace Action, and Task Force on the Americas, we broadcast Thursdays at 4.30 PM Pacific, 7.30 PM Eastern right here on YouTube Live, including channels for the Convo Couch, Popular Resistance, and Code Pink. Post-broadcast recordings can be found at Apple Podcasts Spotify, Telegram, radindymedia.com, and now under podcasts at popularresistance.org. Today's episode, the country is not for sale. Economic Development and Employment Zones, known as ZEDES versus National Sovereignty. I'm really pleased for all of you to meet two very, very knowledgeable guests participating in today's episode. Extremely knowledgeable, super-activists, and I think you'll really appreciate what we're going to share with you today. I have Beth Giglia joining us. She's an Anthropology PhD and Melinda St. Lewis, who is Director of Public Citizens Global Trade Watch. Before I have a starter conversation, I want to give all of you just a brief background as what has been the impetus of today's conversation. You're going to find it fascinating and possibly horrifying at the same time. Let me just share with you something that has recently happened on the Hill in Washington DC. On May 3rd, Democratic U.S. lawmakers urged U.S. trade representative and state department officials to eliminate investor-state dispute settlement provisions from current and future trade deals and to intervene on behalf of Honduras against a U.S. company's nearly $11 billion claim against the country. In a letter to Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and trade representative Katrina Thai, 33 lawmakers said that investor-state dispute settlement systems, known as ISDS, excuse me, in trade deals constitute, quote, a problematic corporate handout, unquote, that violates country's sovereignty and democratic rights. Today, we will specifically discuss investor-state dispute settlement systems within the specific focus of Honduras, but I think it's also important for all of us to keep in mind that this language is used in trade agreements, U.S. trade agreements with many other global South nations, including, I believe, Argentina and Colombia here in Latin America and the Caribbean. So with that, I would like all of you to meet Beth and Melinda and maybe, ladies, we should start with this letter and what the impetus of the letter was and what the 33 members of Congress are hoping to achieve. And then let's give the audience some background as to what led to the need for this letter. So who wants to start? Oh, well, I can jump in. So it's great to be with you all. Thanks for the opportunity, Terri, to raise awareness about this really important letter and important issue. So Senator Elizabeth Warren and Representative Lloyd Doggett, who are senior members of the U.S. Congress, have been concerned for a number of years about how trade agreements have been used by corporations to challenge, as you mentioned, democratic policymaking and public interest policies seeking billions sometimes of dollars of taxpayer money from four countries like Honduras and others when they believe that a law or a government action is a violation of very extreme rights that were granted under these trade agreements. And so when the case that we're going to talk about today in Honduras came to light, Senator Warren and Representative Doggett were appalled. And it was just kind of the latest example of many of cases where corporations are using these extreme rights that have been included in the trade agreements that were snuck in without us understanding what they were to bully governments and or to basically ransack their treasuries. And so that was the impetus of this letter. They wanted to raise awareness about the case that we'll talk about today. And but importantly, that to use it as another example of why it's so critically important for the U.S. government to align our trade policy with our climate change goals, with our goals to promote anti-corruption in other countries, with our goals to promote development, and that right now there is this cross-purposes of our trade agreements with what those other goals are. And we can talk about how this is actually part of a long series of advocacy from Congress to subsequent administrations to change the perspective of the U.S. government and to not just be pushing U.S. corporate interests, but to actually think about how our policies abroad affect human rights, democracy, rule of law, and so forth. It seems to me that these trade agreements have basically created a corporate structure that supersedes democratically elected governments. The people's will. It's superseding national sovereignty and natural resource sovereignty. And that is right. So I mean, the thing that's, I think, hard for folks to grasp is this crazy system that was created under these trade agreements that elevates a private corporation to the level of a nation state to be able to sue that government. That didn't exist previously. Governments are sovereign nations, as you mentioned. But under this system, the corporations are able to have a private right of action. They don't have to convince. This U.S. company does not have to convince the U.S. government to engage in this. They can sue Honduras directly. And they can seek, as you mentioned, $11 billion, which is 2 thirds of Honduras' national budget for 2022. So obviously, this is just an outrageous sum, an absolutely impossible sum. And therefore, they can use that as leverage to bully the government to hopefully do what they want. And that's how companies have been using the system to force countries to settle with them, often, to change their laws or to allow them to continue practices that are harmful, or, again, to be compensated by the taxpayers of those countries. So it's a huge affront to sovereignty. And that's why, actually, it has become very unpopular even in the United States among those who are paying attention. And it's not just Democrats, but Republicans also. Because this is something, the United States actually is also vulnerable to these types of cases. And in fact, we're facing one right now after President Biden canceled the Keystone XL pipeline, we now face a $15 billion case from the Canadian company that was going to build that pipeline. And I think as the United States started to see, wait, oh, this isn't just our corporations going after poorer countries. But actually we could potentially be vulnerable. Now it's no longer popular. But so now that's why we need to translate that ire to say, wait, the US government, it should not be taken before an international tribunal for a corporation. Well, our corporations should not be taking other countries toward international tribunals like what we're seeing with Honduras. So do these, am I correct in understanding that the companies can sue a sovereign nation, a democratically elected government for loss profit and loss of investment like the infrastructure investments they made, that they're suing for that? Yeah, so the idea behind it is that a company when you invest in a foreign country, there is a chance that potentially that country could nationalize your assets. And if they do that, if they expropriate your investment, you have the right to compensation. Now that in other, you can make an argument that that could make sense. But what's happened is that in the context of these agreements, they define what these violations are very broadly. So it's not just if I seize your factory, I have to compensate you. It's if I pass a law that reduces the value of your investment. So that can be environmental protections if you are a fossil fuel company that wants to abuse the environment or a mining company or it could be a public health protection if your investment was actually going to be damaging health. And so it's been interpreted in this very broad way that you get compensated not just for your investment, but that's what you mentioned which is the crazy part is that you can sue for what your expected future profits may have been if that law had not taken been. And so then they inflate out of thin air. We know this company and we'll talk, Beth can talk about what's happened with the company, but they haven't invested even a tiny fraction of what they're suing for. But they claim that if they were able to function as they wanted, at some point in the future, they would make $11 billion. But that's why they are. So, and that's why this has fallen out of favor too because it's not even, we're not even talking about like a leftist idea. When you think about, if you're an investor and you're going to invest someplace, you may make a lot of money, especially if it's a risky investment or you might lose some money. You don't have a right to be compensated because you lost money. And that is kind of the idea now behind these investor states students that they are completely protected from any change in the regulatory environment where they have invested. And that's just simply not the way our national courts work. That's not a standard that in our courts that would be accepted. But because it's this pro-corporate international tribunal that is set up outside of our courts, they've created these whole new rules that are very pro-corporate in terms of their rights. So, Beth, in terms of Honduras specifically, this transnational corporate system, these Zetas, which you know so much about, these were accepted in Honduras during the Juan Orlando Hernandez administration. And over, I don't say overrule, where we're negated or augmented under the current president, GMR Castro, who was democratically elected in November of 2021 by a super majority of the citizens and put an end to 12 years of narco dictatorship in Honduras. So you've got one government that's totally pro-US pro. And I think when the right after the coup was the Lobo government that said, Honduras is open for business. And so this is a byproduct of that philosophy, correct? I mean, it's a byproduct on steroids. Yes, you're absolutely correct. So the Zete law or the Zete project very much starts with the military coup in 2009. So it's after that coup that you, the portfolio Lobo administration launches this campaign that says Honduras is open for business. Honduras sort of goes through a neoliberal shock treatment of sorts, passes a lot of neoliberal reforms to open up the country to foreign resource extraction and foreign direct investment and this kind of thing. And it's at that point when you also see what is kind of a global network of largely libertarian organizations, think tanks, investor capitalists and so forth really start to see Honduras as a place where they can finally experiment with something that they've been dreaming about for a while, which is creating these kinds of micro nations, these kinds of autonomous or quite sovereign territories where they can experiment with very extreme sort of free market systems with systems of private governance and so forth. So it's in 2011 actually when the post coup regimes in Honduras reform the Honduran constitution, they reformed three main articles of the constitution to allow for at the time these zones were called special development regions or reds. It wasn't until later that the ZEVE name comes into play, but they reformed the constitution to basically say, okay, so Honduras has previously had departments and municipal governments. These are the governance divisions of the country and now we're gonna create a separate division which is called the special development region or now the ZEVE. And these are jurisdictions that are gonna be outside of the jurisdiction of municipal governments. So they take land from democratically elected local governments and place it in this new jurisdiction which is now gonna be governed by groups of private investors essentially. And those constitutional reforms also said that these jurisdictions could have their own, their independent judicial systems, sort of independent of the national Honduran judicial system. So this was widely seen in Honduras as neocolonialism as a violation of national sovereignty. And it's actually in 2012 that the Supreme Court of Honduras rules that these jurisdictions are unconstitutional. So there's that initial ruling of unconstitutionality and what happens at that point. So the law was actually passed under the Port Fredio Lobo administration, the special development region's law. And then what happens after this ruling of unconstitutionality is the Congress which is at the time under the leadership of Juan Orlando Hernandez who's president of Congress at the time essentially grants itself the power to remove these justices from the Supreme Court. And it's done under the general auspices of the Supreme Court supposedly creating obstacles for the administration in other realms as well. But then so they use that power then to remove these justices essentially overnight and replace them with their own people on the Supreme Court. So then Congress goes back and passes what is now the 2013 ZEVE law. So that context is really, I think important to have that this is not just a regular kind of investment in Honduras, but that it's really come about through these sort of illegal processes. And what the ZEVE law essentially does is it grants investors the ability to purchase land in Honduras and then create their own governance systems on that land. So to have their own independent courts, their own monetary policies, Prospera for example, which was the first ZEVE in Honduras has made Bitcoin legal tender. They're very much at sort of advancing the expansion of crypto and blockchain economies and ecosystems to create, have their own police and security forces to have their own regulatory regimes, which is something that's also interesting to talk about in the context of Prospera and to essentially create their own models of governance. And so that can, one of the things that makes this so different from a regular special economic zone is you don't have sort of one set of policies that says these are the fiscal incentives or these are the regulatory incentives that we're giving to corporations in order to attract investment. It says that every group of investors can create their own system. And with- So you could potentially have like 20 different investors and 20 different independent sovereign systems within. Well, I guess they're not within Honduras at that point. They're locked cutouts because they don't have to answer to the elected government, to the constitutional institutions of Honduras. They have their own. So they're all like basically like city states or like cutouts, right? They're just like taken extracted part of- Oh my God.  I find it fascinating that, I mean, I'm listening to this thinking, you know, it actually took a coup to get this to happen too, which has been the model throughout the Americas for like 500 years. That it really took a coup in 2009 to make this happen or to get a government receptive to the idea, I guess, is maybe a more diplomatic way to say it. So what happens? So Prospera was the first, the first setting. And so, and it is that cooperation that is suing. That's- Correct, yeah. So the charter for the Prospera jurisdiction, which is on the island of Roatan in Honduras, was actually signed, it was signed behind closed doors at the embassy in Washington, DC, with a body that's called the Committee for the Adoption of Best Practices. And we can go more into that as well. This is basically what the Zede Law does, is it says that it's not even the Honduran Congress that really has the power to, you know, declare these private jurisdictions or to approve them. There's this separate group of people. It's an international committee. It was, you know, first, it was comprised of mostly a majority of US citizens, a lot of sort of familiar faces from the Reagan administration that worked on, you know, Reagan's policy of supporting counterinsurgency efforts in Central America, you know, were operating originally on this committee. And this committee is the group that approves these private jurisdictions with groups of investors. So Prospera Charter was signed in 2018, but it wasn't until 2020 that Hondurans even knew that this jurisdiction existed. So, you know, the investors on the island of Roatan talked to local communities about this being just a regular tourism development. And that's how it was perceived. And it wasn't until 2020 that Hondurans realized what was actually happening with this project. And this was much bigger than a tourism investment that this was really an issue of national sovereignty. And like, as you were saying earlier, that in terms of the different kinds of systems that can be enacted through this policy, Honduras approved three Zeve's before there was a transition in government. So it's also, you know, good to keep in mind that these were sort of kind of pushed through at the end of Juan Orlando and then this is last administration, knowing full well that, you know, a transition to democracy was likely to take place and that this would likely put an end to the Zeve project. So there are three Zeve's in Honduras, there's the Orquilla Zeve, there's the Francisco, there's the Morassan Zeve and there's the Prospera Zeve. And each one has its own system and each one has created its own government system. So, and there's a debate just to go back to what you were saying, there's a debate in Honduras, you know, about what exactly is sovereignty? So the Hondurans and the international investors that support the Zeve's will claim this is not a violation of national sovereignty, you know, the Honduran military still has jurisdiction on this land. And, you know, the articles of the constitution that, you know, apply to the issuing of passports and these kinds of things still apply in these territories. But what you're really doing is you're taking land and you're removing it from democratic, from democratic control. So you're really, you're putting it under another governance system where people don't have equal rights to vote. And so it's really a question about democracy in the end. Do people live inside these economic zones or simply work? What is physically inside? And then I guess the other question is can the Honduran military actually go in? Like to me, it would seem like you're crossing a border at that point, so to speak. Do they have jurisdiction inside those zones or, oh my God, I mean, it just doesn't even seem right. The military does and the Honduran police can be invited into the zones. Can be invited, okay. By the ZAE administrations. Okay, yeah. And do people live in there? Do people go in and work and then leave at the end of the day or do they go, or do they live in there or? So all of these zones are very initial stages of development. And this is also related to the ISDS case. Prospera claims that they've invested around a hundred million in the zone. And they're claiming that Honduras might be liable for up to 10.7 billion.  So these zones are in very initial stages of development. The case with Prospera is that the Prospera company which is based in Washington DC purchased an initial 58 acres of land in the community of Crawfish Rock on the island of Roatan. And this was mostly uninhabited land but of course it is part of Crawfish Rock. It is governed by the Pateronato which is the local governing council of Crawfish Rock was previously governed by the municipality, et cetera. And they're really, Prospera is really trying to attract sort of global digital nomads, people from other countries who are remote workers and might want to relocate and work remotely from a beautiful island and kind of this Caribbean paradise. And that's really sort of the demographic that they're trying to recruit. They're also recruiting people who are invested in the sort of the world of decentralized finance. So people who are interested in crypto investments and then other sort of entrepreneurs and investors. So they're really recruiting people from outside Honduras and they are also recruiting Hondurans for some jobs within the zone. But really up to this point, it's been, they've been constructing sort of like their initial buildings, their initial real estate projects and that kind of thing. So there are very few people living in these zones as of yet. When you say remote workers or nomad workers, it comes to mind and I don't know what the name is, but I've seen like ads, social media ads, and Melinda, you're shaking your head. Is this the same? I mean, really promoting nomadic work and take a year off and go do this. And that's, I don't know where I've seen those ads, but I've seen them quite frequently. I think like probably on Twitter and Facebook, I probably shouldn't use those two names, but social media, I don't know that I've seen them print ads, but is that the sort of thing that Prospera is attracting are those people? That sort of... Well, I think it remains to be seen. I mean, there's definitely been a broader kind of digital nomad movement and I wouldn't paint all of it as moving into this kind of said they framework. I think they are trying, but my sense is that they are trying to track that, but then the other kind of mind-blowing thing is that you can become an E resident of Prospera. You don't have to live there. If you pay them fees, you can be an E resident and then you can avail yourself of their deregulatory framework if you want to start a business. So you can incorporate your business in Prospera Zévé, even if you don't live there. And then they advertise the fact that it is, that there are way fewer steps to register a business that you can provide your own. You can choose a regulatory code from any OECD country or you can propose your own to the council. They say that the labor, the minimum wage is... Or labor laws, it's more flexible labor environment than in Honduras or in the United States. So I think it's both potentially the tourist element, but then it also is this idea of kind of a deregulatory business environment that seems to be a lot of what they're selling. So as an E resident, you could incorporate your business within the Prospera Zévé and run your business anywhere in the world? Is that, or do you have to like run it inside that Zévé or inside what we geographically, how we geographically define Honduras? Or is this just an instrument to set up? You know, wow. You can run your business anywhere once you're incorporated there or we don't know that yet. We're waiting to see if that's what happens. I think there's a lot that's yet to be seen in exactly how this is gonna work, but I think that it's maybe somewhat similar to how companies register in Delaware, for example. So register your company where there's favorable, like a favorable regulatory framework to then be able to operate. And a lot of this is also geared towards digital assets and the kind of business that is done virtually in general. So yeah, so as Melinda mentioned, the Prospera jurisdiction offers four different options for regulatory frameworks for investors. And one of them is to adopt regulatory framework of another OECD country. Another is to propose your own regulations to be approved by the Prospera government. And the other is to operate under what's basically a liability system where you have a certain kind of liability insurance and you are subject to being sued for causing harm to another party or to an individual, but largely free of regulations. Wow, it's a whole superstructure. Superceiving elected governments. I mean, it's really scary. It's really, so what else should we, what else should the audience know about Zed is? Are they, is this a, I guess my question would be, this isn't just occurring in Honduras. My understanding is there are now in Colombia, people that are petitioning the new government, the Petro government to do something about the mining concessions that are similarly managed and regulated in Colombia. Am I correct in that or? So I think there's a wide spectrum of sort of these extraterritorial jurisdictions, right? We have all sorts of different kinds of free trade zones, export processing zones, a lot of resource extraction takes place in the context of legal loopholes and these kinds of exemptions for corporations and that kind of thing. And I tend to think that these things kind of exist on a spectrum. And I think in Honduras, you see the most extreme form of this. And the global investors that are involved in the project talk about it this way. This is very much a Vanguard project. This is very much pushing the boundaries of corporate sovereignty in other countries, pushing the boundaries of what they claim is the nation state having a monopoly on sovereignty and how can we break that and how can we gain access to territory to form our own government? So I think Honduras is a very extreme example. You see similar kinds of enclaves popping up all over the world that I think are pursuing similar interests. So for example, you have Bitcoin City in El Salvador. And this is sort of very much along the same lines of groups of investors who are committed to expanding what they call the decentralized, what they call decentralized finance. Hoping that this decentralized system, what is essentially an unregulated financial system can eventually take over the global financial system. And so you see these kinds of like crypto and Bitcoin enclaves in the form of some kind of special jurisdiction or some kind of urban project popping up all over the world. And I think Honduras is where they have gotten the furthest in creating an actual legal system to get the kind of sovereignty that they're after. And I think that one thing that is particularly unique about the Zedé law in Honduras is that it creates a template for really, for making these jurisdictions very easy to set up. So it's like I said before, it's kind of removing the power to do that, which nation states all over the world create special jurisdictions, but sort of taking the power to do that and giving it to these unelected, secretive, completely non-transparent organizations that are given the power to create these jurisdictions. And then in the case of the Zedé law, once the jurisdiction is created, for example, Prospera, they're easily expandable. So Prospera can expand not by getting approval from the Honduran Congress or even the committee for the adoption of best practices, but they can expand by just having a contract with the private landowner. And it can be a private landowner actually anywhere in the country. So it doesn't have to be contiguous to the existing Prospera jurisdiction. And they did that with the case of, shortly after Prospera became the special jurisdiction, they incorporated the Satouye Port on mainland Honduras, which does not share a border with Prospera, but they did that just through a private agreement. So you really have created this system where these zones can just expand without any democratic oversight. And this is part of sort of the long-term vision of this model is to create hubs, for example, a hub in Roatan, potentially hubs in Southern Honduras and different parts of Honduras. And then as they can go about convincing other governments to enact the same kind of legislation, they can open hubs all over the world with using the same governance system, which they call an operating system, but essentially using the, for example, the Prospera government. And then also creating these virtual jurisdictions, as Melinda was talking about, so creating the option for e-citizenship and creating a jurisdiction that kind of exists virtually outside of the sort of material territory. And then if Honduras reforms their laws and closes the Zedes, for example, or for another country does the same, you have a group of residents that are sort of automatically citizens of these hubs everywhere else and can simply take their capital and take their businesses and go elsewhere or continue operating through the virtual jurisdiction. So it really does create, I'm trying to sort of give the image of how it creates this sort of meta structure that again supersedes national sovereignty and really aims to eventually operate independently of nation states. That's kind of the long-term vision. I think Honduras, the law that was passed in Honduras is sort of the closest that investors have gotten to really creating a system that comes close to that. And in our last few minutes, Kim, let's talk about what Xiomara Castro has done in response to all of this. She was elected president, as we said earlier by a significant majority of Honduran citizens in November of 2021, her inauguration ended 12 years of narco dictatorship in the country. And one of the first things she did was outlaw, reverse, I'm not sure what the correct technical term is, this law and that reversal, her reversal of this is what triggered the Prospero lawsuit, correct? That's how, okay. So what exactly did she do? She was elected, this is one of the things she was elected to do. So, yeah, the ZEI issue was absolutely, it was a central point in the platform of the Opposition Coalition. And it was in April of 2022, it was actually the Honduran Congress that voted unanimously to repeal the ZEI law. And this was really seen as a victory for democracy, for the rule of law, for sort of taking the country back from 12 years of narco dictatorship, it's taking the institutions back under democratic control. I think it's also to note, you asked earlier what else should people know about the ZEI's, it's really important I think to mention the resistance that there has been to ZEI's inside Honduras. And so in 2020, there was a period of time when a lot of Hondurans thought that the ZEI was basically a dead project, that it wasn't going to come to fruition. The government was constantly saying that any month now, the first ZEI was going to be launched, they were largely talking about the Southern part of the country, they weren't talking about Baruatan. And it was in 2020 when this becomes front and center as a national issue again. And you start to see communities and people throughout Honduras really sort of reviving local democracy in the face of this kind of privatization project. So even though what the ZEI law does is it allows investors to take land from municipal governments, municipal governments don't have any say in whether or not this happens in their territory according to the law. As I mentioned before, in areas of low population density, ZEI's don't require any approval by the Congress of Honduras. So it's really done between the committee for the adoption of best practices and the investors. And the municipal governments are extremely disempowered in this process. And what Hondurans did was to really sort of revive local mechanisms of democracy and organized what they call cabillos abiertos, which is kind of like a municipal level referendum or vote. And they voted there, dozens of municipalities voted their municipalities to be free of ZEI. So this was a way of reclaiming democracy, reclaiming sovereignty over local jurisdictions. So I think it's important to note sort of the local resistance or the regional resistance to ZEI as well as what happened on a national level with the repeal of the ZEI law. And really that should be the end of the story. And I think that's why it's looking now at what the trade agreements, the layer that the trade agreements create, because this was a massive democratic action to try to reclaim democracy rule of law within Honduras. They won, they changed the law, they elected a government that was ready to do that. And now the company has these extra rights that have been granted to them under the Central America Free Trade Agreement with the United States that says they have these broad investor rights. And so they're using that to then challenge the fact that challenge the repeal of this law and saying that it shouldn't apply to them, that they had signed a legal stability agreement with the outgoing government, which of Juan Orlando Hernandez, which obviously is, you would think would be a pretty shaky legal territory. And yet they are using that to advance this claim for $11 billion. And it's going, this will now be happening outside of national courts in an arbitration, the arbitration tribunal, there will be three private sector lawyers who will be appointed to be the arbitrators for this. One appointed by the company, one appointed by the government and they will choose a third or it will be assigned by the tribunal, which is under the auspices of the World Bank. And those three private sector lawyers will decide, you know, this case. And in the meantime, the Honduran government must seek legal counsel. It's extremely expensive to defend yourself. You have to pay half of the arbitration costs, which are extremely high because they earn private sector lawyer rates. They are not judges. They're not salaried employees. They receive an incentive to have these cases go on very long and then to make this decision. So, and it's all done behind closed doors. We have not yet seen even the claim that Prospera has given against the Honduran government. That is currently confidential. It's potentially, they may be ordered to make it not confidential, but there's no rules under the system that provides an opportunity to see. There's no rules for them, period. Except their own, yeah. Yeah, so that's why, you know, it's important like what Senator Warren represented dogged in the 33 members of Congress said that we need to remove these extreme investor rights so that governments, when they are reclaiming democracy, like a case like this, are not then being now subject to having to deal with this outrageous investor state claim when obviously the president Castro has a lot that she has to be dealing with within the country now to have to divert resources toward this case is just, it's an abomination. But it's almost like the lawsuit is intentional in doing that. Like it's preventing her from any sort of state investment and that would force privatization in a way or at least philosophically. It's, if this $11 billion that the Honduran government is being sued for is I think you said earlier, two thirds. Of their entire national budget. Of their entire 2022 national budget. I mean, it's almost like there's, the strategy is a specific intent to bankrupt the country. Or to scare them enough that then they decide to just back off and allow visiting to continue. And that was pretty clear in the notice of intent that was put forward. I mean, they said, we don't want to move forward with this case. We want the Honduran government to, to agree to this. Wow. Hey, it's really, it's really horrifying. It's like neoliberal capitalism on steroids. Just, yeah. Wow. Well, thank you, ladies. My gosh. There's so much more to talk about here. And I would love to have you come back and watch how we can maybe analyze how this letter is affecting decisions on the Hill, what ultimately comes. Because as you said, I mean, it could affect the United States too. And I agree that's the threat to the United States is really the impetus for changing the law. Unfortunately, that's what it takes. But if that's what it takes and this structure can be changed, then we should do it. And really, like I said, this is actually now, actually under the previous Trump administration when they renegotiated the North America free trade agreement, they actually removed a lot of this ISDS from it. And which would even under Republican administration. And now President Biden has said that he no long, he does not support investor state dispute settlement and any future trade agreements, which is a great victory. They are not seeking this and any future agreements. And so the ask of this letter is to align our past agreements with the current thinking and the current policy. So we are hopeful that we can really make some real strides. Governments in Europe have been withdrawing from a treaty called the Energy Charter Treaty, which also included investor state dispute settlement in it. And countries like Germany, France, they have been withdrawing from this because they say, well, if we're going to address climate change, we can't have these fossil fuel corporations or others suing our governments as we pass climate policies. And so the tide is really turning. And so we think that there's a real opportunity right now to push to end this kind of ridiculous system. So we as activists, what can we do? Should we be circulating this letter? Should we be advocating for more sign-ons? We should definitely go to Honduras and see for ourselves what's happening there. I would advocate for a visit anywhere to really understand a situation and how people are organizing and responding to it. But here in the States, what's the best thing for us to do now as activists? Well, so we actually, I think there will be more opportunities relatively soon. I think now that this letter from those members of Congress has come out, there are efforts to have a broad organizational sign-on letter to the administration in support of this, which we can share in the future. That's for organizations, activists. I think you could follow some of the organizations that are part of this effort and we can provide more information. So tradewatch.org is our website and we will be putting additional information on there soon. There's also the Center for Economic and Policy Research has been really active Institute for Policy Studies. The Latin America Working Group, a number of organizations have been raising awareness about this and I think there will be opportunities to weigh in with the administration very soon. Right. Thank you so much. Beth, is there anything you'd like to add in closing? No, I don't think so. I think Melinda pretty much summed it up. So for the audience, I'll be sure to put the links into all these organizations, tradewatch, Ceper, IPS, Log, I'll put links in the program notes. For the audience, I'll put the link in the home page. The Honduran Solidarity Network also. Oh, of course.  Karen Springs specifically, because she really facilitated today's conversation and I'm just so thankful that both of you are available to have this really, really important conversation and it's really necessary for those of us in the States to understand what's happening to our neighbors in the global South and what we can do to stop it and to help ourselves in the long run as well. So I will include all of the links to those organizations in the program notes. I'll also include the link to the Warren letter so that people can see that as well. So, okay. Thank you so much, Beth and Melinda. What a really informative and helpful conversation and just so nice to work with both of you. Really enjoyed it. So I want to remind the audience that you've been watching what the F is going on in Latin America and the Caribbean. We are a popular resistance broadcast. We air on Thursday evening, 7.30 p.m. Eastern on three YouTube channels, Popular Resistance Code Pink and the Convo Count and you can also find the audio recordings at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. So thank you ladies and for the audience. We'll see you next week.


Hello Matt, how are you? I'm good yourself. Good. Should you go back to that senior golf softball tournament and wherever wherever Hillman went? It was in it was supposed to be in Vegas and since Nevada doesn't let them play in games like that, they moved it to St. George, which is over in Utah. It's about 40 miles east and I played there before. It's a beautiful complex, but Utah is a little more lenient and so they played there and I just don't get it. The last tournament of the year comes up in November in Phoenix, as it always is, and I told our team, I go, it's not worth it. To go on an airplane, sleep in a bed that you don't know who cleaned it or who slept in it last and it's just not worth it. I guess Steve went, I've been trading emails with him. He plays on that elite team and I still don't understand how come he hasn't made the senior softball Hall of Fame because you watch him play. I see him play many, many times and he's such an elite player for a 65, well, he's 70 like me. He plays as a 70 this year. He's such an elite player. It's just amazing and I ask him, I go, how do you do it? He goes, I'd be profan. That's probably true. Yeah. Oh, good. Dan, I'm here. I'm having a little camera trouble today, but I am here. Thanks Lisa. My apologies. I'll have it fixed. That's okay. That's okay. Roberto, I think we have everyone. Okay. Yes, I think you're good to go. Thank you. Okay, we'll go ahead and call the meeting of the contract reduce subcommittee to order. Secretary Aether, if you could do a roll call please. Yes, Chairman Galvin. Here. Board Member Badden-Fort. Here. Board Member Mullen. Here. Thank you all for being here. Reminder to mute your phones and microphones when you're not speaking and to put away your cell phones and your personal computers. So we'll move to the first item, which is public comments. We're now taking public comments on item two. If you wish to make a comment via Zoom, please raise your hand. If you are dialing in via telephone, please dial star nine to raise your hand. Secretary Aether, do we have anyone? No, there's no public comment at this time. Very good. That'll take care of the public comments. We will move then to item 3.1. Director Burke. Thank you, Chair Galvin. Item 3.1 is a proposed professional agreement for legal services with Bold, Polesner, Maddow, Nelson, and Judson, and City Attorney Sue Gallagher. We're very happy to have her join us, and she'll be presenting this item for the subcommittee's consideration. Welcome, Sue. Thank you, and good afternoon. And yes, it's my first time appearing before you, so I'm pleased to have the opportunity, although I am sad for the circumstances. So as you know, our wonderful colleague, Molly McLean, has announced her departure from the city effective October 8th. As you know, Molly's been very integral with the water department and with the BPU, providing really the highest level of legal support to both the department and the board for the last five years, and has served the city with outstanding service for many more years than that, so almost 15 years. We're going to miss her very, very much. We anticipate a recruitment to fill her position is likely to take four to six months. We will move as quickly as we can, but also very much want to find a replacement that at least can come close to filling her shoes. We want to find someone with experience in the water field, and so we do want to take our time. So in the interim, we've decided that we need to have outside counsel to assist us to cover us during this period. As you may be aware, after solicitation, we received two very strong proposals, both from firms with extensive experience in the field of water, both who we've also worked with over time, so we're familiar with both of them. After interviews and further discussions, we have determined that the law firm, and I know Jennifer just read the name, but it's Bold, Paul Eisner, Maddow, Nelson, and Judson, was the preferred firm. Bob Maddow himself will be the lead counsel. We appreciate that. He's an extremely experienced and respected attorney in the field. You may already know him or have had worked with him. He's been in the field for more than 40 years, and again, very highly respected, and we're lucky to have him available to work with us. Also, his partner, Carl Nelson, will also be key in providing services. He also has decades of experience and also is very highly respected, so we're very pleased to have the opportunity to work with them both. They do have a larger firm, so they will be able to access associates and other partners as need be, but really those two, and primarily Bob Maddow, will be our primary contacts. We've negotiated contract. It's in our standard legal services form. The scope of services includes a full service to both the department and the BPU, commensurate with what Molly has been providing over these years. I'll just give you a sense, too. We also provided in the scope of service an indication of some of the specific projects that we'll be asking the firm to help us with during this time. These are things that I know are critical to the board and to the department, and we want to make sure there's no gap in services. That includes our regular Board of Public Utilities supports, so Bob will be attending your meetings, will be participating, obviously, by Zoom for the time being. He will be reviewing all the agendas and addressing any issues that arise out of your meetings. In addition, some of the projects are the wastewater bond sale. They'll be overseeing that. The Regional Organics Processing Potter Valley Project will be monitoring that and participating in those discussions. There are Prop 218 water and sewer rate setting and our demand fee study that's underway. The 2020 Urban Water Management Plan also underway. The NPDES wastewater permit appeal petition that we're working on, and also all the issues that are surrounding that, the no net loading, and I know you are all very familiar with the issues that are coming up with respect to that permit. The firm will also be working with us on water department specific contracts, so we like to have those contracts. Our regular contract attorney will also look at them, but really it's best to have the person who's most integrated into the department and with the board to be reviewing those contracts and making sure that they address the needs of water. So those are the general, that's the general scope of services. Again, that's not limited to those projects, but I did want to make note for you that we have specifically called out those projects because of their critical nature. The rates that they have offered are really very good, very positive for us. It's $300 an hour. Again, both of these men have experience, decades worth of experience, and the highest expertise in these fields, so that is a very good outside legal counsel rate. We are anticipating 20 to 30 hours a week from the firm, and so the enough to exceed amount is $230,000. Again, we're basing that on 30 hours at $300 an hour per week for approximately six months. So I'm happy to answer any questions that you might have about the contract or about the firm, about our efforts to try to keep Molly here. You didn't tire up. I was going to try, but thought I might get in trouble. Okay. Thank you, Sue. Board member comments or questions? Sure.  Thank you, Sue, for joining us. I appreciate it. In exhibit C, we kind of talk about, obviously, this firm seems, I mean, there doesn't seem to be a more aligned and experienced firm for what we are seeking for what we need moving forward. I also certainly don't take any issue with the rates. I think that that was well negotiated, but you do call out the potential for conflicts of interest, especially as we start to look at any rates or fee studies, the wholesale water supply and contractual relationships with possibly our vendors or our Vindies. Can you share a little bit about how does the city experiences with other legal contractors? What's the process? If that should arise, because obviously it will be difficult then to pivot to a different contractor that may or may not have that same conflict. Sure. And I'll address and then Molly, I welcome if you have additional comments as well. It is not uncommon that we run into this when we hire outside council. We're in a lucky position if we don't have that any conflict, potential conflicts that arise, if there's a direct conflict, we won't go with that firm. But if there's, excuse me, if it's just a potential, that's not uncommon at all. And in fact, in both of the firms that we talked to, there were potential areas of conflict. So we're going to deal with that with either of these firms. In the event that the firm does have to set a step aside, we will have to pivot to another firm. But we are not anticipating that that will happen, but we do have to have that protection in place just in case. And that takes a simple and I would just add that it's full disclosure for attorneys to advise new clients on matters where there could be even a potential for conflict and what would happen in those instances. This is really in an abundance of caution and to make sure that they're in compliance with the rules of professional responsibility for attorneys practicing in California to just let their clients know that there is that possibility. The particular issues that present the possibility of conflict aren't likely to present a direct conflict of interest within the six month period of time that the city would need the services. But it's just, like I said, an abundance of caution. And I think when you get into specialized areas of practice like water, you're going to have some a lot, it's a smaller world. And that's what the city attorney was saying that that possibility is not unlikely. Great. Thank you. And Lisa, sorry. This is Jennifer. If I could just add to we know this firm has had long standing relationships with two of our fellow water contractors North Marin Water District and Valley of the Moon Water District. I did reach out and talk to North Marin just to make sure that they had no concerns. They don't. Valley of the Moon is in transition right now. So there is no one for me to talk to at the moment. But I don't think that will really be a concern. And from a technical perspective on the items we're working on, we do have common interest in relation to the restructured agreement and Potter Valley project. So I think from that perspective, you know, we should be fine. But as both Sue and Molly pointed out, we just need to be very clear and the abundance of caution, make sure that this is aware. Great. Thank you. Thank you. First of all, before I ask my questions, I just want to say that I respect the process you've gone through. I also very much respect Molly's work. She's done with the BPU in the short time I've been here in my two stints. You've always been very clear on the guidance you've given us. And that's a tremendous help when you make the level of decisions that we make with this body. And I wanted to say that for so Sue hears it as well. So she probably already knows that. But secondly, so that's the preface to my questions. And again, I mean, no disrespect to the questions I'm going to ask, nor am I casting any aspersions on the legal profession, Mr. Chair. So let me go ahead with my questions. First is curious what the other law firm that we didn't choose, are you able to say that publicly? No, we generally don't reveal the other. Okay. The reason I was asking that is if we, it sounds like one potential conflict could be something related to Potter Valley or something dealing with the water age, Sonoma water, since a couple of those contractors that this firm has done work for could have an issue. So I was just curious if we should let the previous firm that we didn't choose and must that we chose didn't choose them for a reason should have them sort of in the backseat ready to step in in the event that there was a conflict and we had to pivot to another firm. And as I mentioned, it is a firm that we already contract with and have relationship with. So certainly if we needed services, they're one of the firms that we might turn to. And again, as Molly indicated, we really are not expecting that these potential conflicts will come to fruition. This is just to be most clear and most cautious. But the other firm is someone that we do have an existing contract on other matters. Great. Thank you for that. My only other question is relative to article two about the compensation element. It seems to roll everything in and I commend you for negotiating a $300 an hour rate. That's pretty awesome actually. But the issue that I'm specifically concerned about and it's because I had an issue with a firm that I dealt with some many years ago on this very issue when they're out of town attorneys and they have to come on a regular basis, whether it's right now it's on Zoom, but at some point it could return to a normal you drive up to City Hall and have your meetings here like we've had done in the past. Mileage. I realize that travel expenses are not so you've done a great job of rolling everything into the hourly rate and again I commend you for that. But the issue of mileage, this firms in Walnut Creek, are they on the clock the minute they drive leave their office in Walnut Creek if they have to drive up here for a meeting or some sort of other business related to the to the city that they're hired for? Do they get mileage? They would have to look at the specifics but they'll get paid their hourly rate for that entire time. I don't know if you're talking about additional mileage, you know the 50 cents an hour. No I'm talking about the they would be entitled to their travel time as well under the contract. And again the reason that led me to have this sort of encounter with the previous law firm was the fact that well when we're driving up to wherever they're driving we can't conduct business and of course we all know better because now we have cell phones and you can do a lot of business when you're driving an hour and a half or two hours up irregardless of the traffic. So I always have a problem with that. Yes and I didn't mean to interrupt I'm sorry. No that's all right. Again we are anticipating that we'll be in a in a remote work situation for some period of time quite possibly for the entire six months. Certainly I would anticipate through the end of the year that we'll be in remote meetings and Zoom meetings. And the other comment that I would make is that to the extent yes we all know there was a time when no when you were in the road you weren't doing any business now it's not uncommon to be getting on the phone shortly after you start driving and you're on the phone until you get back. If it is work for us then obviously that's spilled to us but they should not be double billing in terms of billing for our for the travel time plus billing a different client for whatever time they're on the phone. So I know there are a lot of stories of attorneys doing that but I would I would certainly trust this law firm and both Bob Matow and Carl Nelson that that would not be there. Certainly we can certainly confirm that also. Okay I appreciate. Just add board member Mullen I understand your point as well that typical for these kinds of contracts to you know cover the travel time for attorneys to come back and forth from their primary location. It is something that can be negotiated. We did not do that in this case because I think it is expected that the services will be virtual provided you know remotely for the most part if not entirely. But it's also something you can you know talk to specific firms about if and when it arises that there's an extensive amount of travel time from their location you know to the city for different meetings that that could be a point of discussion. I don't I don't think it's going to come up here as we discussed but it is something that you know sometimes can be negotiated. And again I trust I trust the process that you've gone through and the negotiations you've done and so we can't get everything we want and again I think the fact that you've got such a terrific hourly rate I think we should probably bank that and just move forward. So I appreciate the responses. Thank you. So obviously it's it's envisioned even meetings with staff would be done zoom-wise they're not going to be coming up here just to meet one-on-one with staff. Good. I'm I'm perfectly fine with the agreement. The hourly rate obviously is good. Looks like it's a quality firm so I have no problems with it. Any other board member questions or comments? All right we will now take public comments on item 3.1. If you wish to make a comment via zoom please raise your hand. If you're dialing in via telephone please dial star 9 to raise your hand. Secretary Aitha do we have anyone? There are no public comments. Thank you then I would ask for recommendation from the committee. Go ahead. Go for it for member Mullen. I was going to recommend we to the full board that we approved this contract for interim legal services and waive the reading of the text. We'll gladly second. Great we have a first and a second to give a full recommendation to the board all in favor or actually secretary Aitha if you would do a roll call. Yes chairman Galvin. Hi. Board member Badenfort. Remember Mullen. Hi. Great passes unanimously. I don't believe we have any other items on our agenda. Any other comments by board members or committee members? If not Molly we'll see you before you leave but I guess this will probably be your last contract review subcommittee meeting so thanks for all your hard work on this committee and with all the contracts that we've had to review over the years and we'll see you next week and we are adjourned. Thanks again thank you Sue for being here. And thank you very much I appreciate it. Thank you. Goodbye. Bye everyone.


I'm on the campus of the University of Western States where I'm taking a continuing education class put on by the McKenzie Institute USA and this is part A of McKenzie for the Lumbar Spine and I thought I'd do some videos as I take these continuing ed courses giving a little overview of the course and my recommendation whether you should take them. McKenzie also known as mechanical diagnosis and therapy was developed by a New Zealand physiotherapist named Robin McKenzie. The treatment differs from a lot of chiropractic treatments in a number of ways mainly in that it focuses heavily on assessment using mechanical diagnosis and subgrouping patients based on their classification. What you look for is a directional preference so that's a certain direction of movement which reduces the symptoms particularly a phenomenon known as centralization and centralization is when peripheral symptoms come closer to the center of the spine and so if you've got radiculopathy down to the foot it comes up to the calf or to the thigh or to the buttock or all the way up to the center of the back. Some of the other features is that it leans heavily on patient education and self-treatment and so for a lot of the time the clinician is not providing any treatment to the patient but simply guiding them through movements that reduce their symptoms and giving them home exercises. In this way it builds self-reliance and removes the dependence on the practitioner which leads to greater outcomes in the end. The course is about 20 hours but there are five different parts parts A through E which could then go on to include a diploma they're broken into these different parts which go over one weekend they're about 20 hours and they're five hours of online learning and so you can learn the basics online before you take the course there's some didactic portions of lecture and then there is a lot of hands on so today has just been the first day we've learned the basics tomorrow we'll come back we're going to start putting it into use I'll give you my impressions at the end of the weekend we just got out for lunch so we're taking an hour break and today has been good we've got some hands on we spent the morning watching an assessment of a real-life patient a live demo of a volunteer patient who came in and saw some results but what was kind of nice is that it wasn't a home run and so it wasn't just a clear-cut miracle which is important because I think a lot of times in these courses they talk about the wins they talk about those perfect patients where everything went well but you don't see what to do if it doesn't happen like the textbook if it doesn't happen like those miracle patients one of the nice things about mackenzie is even if you don't get the patient well in the first visit you're still making progress you're still assessing as you go and better able to classify where the patient goes what subgroup and sometimes that subgroup is something that you're not going to treat with the mackenzie method it's going to be something where you either use your other tools as a chiropractor or a PT or you send them out for a referral so it was good to see that it's not always heroic measures that that happen but you're always making progress and then we also started working on each other practicing these movements practicing these prone extensions and over pressure applying different forces all right it's day three of mackenzie part a course we've wrapped things up gone through the rest of the protocols or the the movements that we learn flexion side gliding adding rotation so these are the less common ways to treat patients or at least statistically less common and so just some thoughts at the end of the course i really like mackenzie i think it can plug in to almost any practice style but also gives you as a clinician a way to think about a patient's pain we talk a lot about clinical certainty and i don't think certainty is realistic if you read Burton certainty is a biological impossibility but i do like talking about confidence so as a doctor you should have confidence in what you're doing with a patient and knowing that even if right now i'm not getting the result that i expect that if i keep going down this path i'm going to get an answer so we may not know exactly the answer that we're going to get but we know that we're going to come to one and that from that answer we can make the next steps and i think that sums up pretty well mackenzie and uh how it can help you in your clinic it's not hands off we do use our hands we do touch the patient you can still adjust you may not adjust uh say the lumbar if it is a lumbar dysfunction uh but you still are going to treat the patient the way that you know how while starting the assessment using this this method so i think it's great for students i think it's great for practicing doctors who have not been familiar with this and it just may change your mind okay thanks for taking the time to watch this video you might have been able to tell that uh some time has passed since i recorded that video i have a backlog of videos that have taken me years now just to finish editing so if you like that video if you found it interesting if you want to see more please leave me a comment hit that like button hit subscribe and that will tell me that yes people are watching this and i will continue to edit my backlog of videos and i will continue to make new videos such as the books that i read last year that i found interesting for chiropractors and the books that i'm planning on reading this year that i think would be interesting for chiropractors to read and my thoughts on current events in chiropractic and the state of continuing education in the profession so i have lots of ideas but i need to know that someone is paying attention so please hit that like button hit subscribe leave me a comment and tell me what you think we should be talking about in chiropractic in 2021 thanks again for watching i'll see you in the next one


Hi there, a while back I took a look at every Disney SNES game, so now let's take a look at each Looney Tunes, Tiny Tunes, and Warner Bros. Super Nintendo game. I should mention that Looney Tunes was a huge, huge part of my childhood, and I'm a ginormous fanboy of anything involving Chuck Jones or Carl Staling, so some of that might bleed over in this video. Going in alphabetical order, starting with Acme Animation Factory, and as you might guess from the title, this is a Mario Paint-style game compatible with the SNES mouse. It allows you to edit pre-made sprite animations and place them in different scenes, and you can compose your own music as well. As far as Mario Paint clones go, this one is pretty good. Obviously it's completely outdated by today's standards, but if you have a small child, this one along with Mario Paint might be entertaining for them. Animaniacs isn't Looney Tunes, but it is a Warner Bros. game, and a Warner Sister game, so I'm including it anyway. This one's developed by Konami, and it's kind of weird. You wander around a world map visiting various sound stages on the Warner Bros. studio, each representing a parody of a film genre, so yeah, the actual show is represented well here, and the game gets the sense of humor down well enough. As for the actual gameplay, it's odd. You only really have a dash attack, and there's no health bar, or even lives. You play as the three main characters trying to recover 24 pages of a script while avoiding enemies sent by Pinky and the Brain. Yeah, they're here too. You can throw various items you find lying around, and there's some interesting platforming elements here and there, and the level design allows you to be inventive with certain stuff, as you can see. And there's also this slot machine that activates every five coins you collect, but all it really does is either add to your coin total or take them away, and every 100 coins you get an extra continue. While there's some cool level design here, this game is just okay. There's better on this list. Next is Bugs Bunny Rabbit Rampage. I remember renting this one as a kid and having fun with it, so I might be a bit biased here. If nothing else, this is a great idea for a game, with Bugs being trapped in a world and tormented by an anonymous cartoon animator. The presentation here is fantastic, revisiting all sorts of old Bugs Bunny cartoons throughout 10 levels and seeing familiar characters like Marvin the Martian, that gigantic angry wrestler, and even Toro the Bull. In other words, it's like Mickey Mania, but with Bugs Bunny cartoons. The only thing with this game is the actual platforming. The bug's sprite is pretty big and unusually lanky compared to most other platformer sprites, and it can take a while to get a good feel for how he jumps and controls. But the game is fair and gives you plenty of opportunities to get used to things, and there's an incentive to do so thanks to all the level design and the inventive premise behind the game. I wouldn't call Bugs Bunny Rabbit Rampage as good as anything like the Capcom Disney games, but it's still pretty good. Next, we have Daffy Duck the Marvin missions, based on the series of Duck Dodgers in the 24th and a half century cartoons, with Daffy as Duck Dodgers, Porky Pig as his assistant, and Marvin Martian as the villain. Again, this is a side-scrolling platformer, although with a bit more of an action slant this time, with Daffy being able to use five different guns across 20 levels, a freeze gun, an electric gun, a spread gun, a grenade launcher, and an anti-matter gun, and you collect money throughout each stage to pay for ammunition. You also have a jet pack to zip around each stage, and in addition to that, a shield, and this is one of those games where when you see an enemy, you put that shield up as soon as you can, wait for them to attack, and then shoot them. Otherwise, it's not likely you'll last long in this game, and that's kind of a bummer. The main problem, however, is the controls. They're extremely slippery and not easy to get used to. Also, it takes a ton of hits to destroy even insignificant enemies, let alone bosses. This game is okay. It's kind of a run-and-gun style where you can fly, so that's kind of cool, but if you want a game like that, you're better off with something like Sparkster or Sky Blazer. Believe it or not, of all the games in this video, the best might be Looney Tunes B-Ball. It's pretty much the Looney Tunes equivalent of an NBA Jam game, so there's no fowls, tons of ridiculous dunks, and a lot of fun, silly stuff. You collect these gems on the court so you can later buy power-ups you can use during the game, like hitting your opponent in the face with a pie to create a turnover and how do you not love that? There's plenty of familiar characters you can play as. They're all animated well, and it's four-player compatible. Plus, there's tons of weird stuff like the ball turning into a dog when there's a Shot Clock violation. I wish I had more to say here, but it's really that simple. Looney Tunes B-Ball is a lot of fun and one of the best basketball games on the Super Nintendo. It's a good time. For a change of pace, we have Porky Pig's Haunted Holiday, with the goal of the game being to guide Porky through his nightmares, which take place in a hellish, snowy landscape, underwater ruins, and a desert where it's literally raining cats and dogs. Again, like Rabbit Rampage and Looney Tunes B-Ball, this is such a great idea for a game that I wish they did more with it, but the game itself is pretty good. This is one of those platformers with much more of an emphasis on jumping and dodging. You do have a projectile attack, but your priority here should be to dodge enemies first since they can appear from nowhere. The game controls well. This has tighter controls than the other platformers in this video, and the music fits the game well, and the visuals are of course fantastic. This one's a little on the easy side, but it's worth checking out. Chalk Up Roadrunner's Death Valley Rally is kind of a missed opportunity. Like most other games on this list, it captures the visual style of the cartoon almost perfectly, and the goal of the game is to have Roadrunner just outrun the coyote and avoid getting caught, and he'll use explosives and even this comical Batman outfit to try and catch him. Roadrunner has kind of a turbo meter that can be replenished by eating bird seed. The problem, though, is that with a game predicated on speed, you gotta have intuitive level design to compliment your character's abilities, and it's just not here. Sonic 2, this is not. Combine that with some sloppy hit detection, and this is a frustrating one to play. Unfortunately, I'd have to say avoid this one. Interestingly, this game also received a sequel titled, While E's Revenge, where you control While E Coyote and try and catch the Roadrunner, but it was never finished or released since the developer Sunsoft went bankrupt in 1995. There is a ROM available, though, so you can at least play through the first level if you'd like. It should be noted, though, that if you get even within a few pixels of the Roadrunner, he sprints away, so that's unfortunate. According to an interview on SNES Central with the producer of the game, the goal was to collect parts to set up an elaborate trap to catch the Roadrunner. But I mean, what's the point if you can never catch him? This game seemed doomed from the start. Sticking with unfinished, unreleased games, there's also Sylvester and Tweety, another game that got cancelled thanks to Sunsoft declaring bankruptcy. This is a ROM available to play, but unfortunately, there's really not much here.  Interestingly, there was another game in development from a completely different company titled Tweety and Sylvester, and that game was also cancelled. Weird. Speedy Gonzales Los Gatos Bandidos is another side-scrolling platformer and another game featuring a very fast character, but thankfully this game doesn't have Speedy flailing out of control like in the Roadrunner games. This one's a little more controlled, and the level design is much better suited for your character's skill set. Speedy's friends are all partying it up until Sylvester and his buds come and kidnap them, so it's up to Speedy to rescue them. And there's usually a handful of mice placed in each stage to rescue, and they double his check points as well. Speedy Gonzales can kick and occasionally pick up stuff if necessary, but this is pretty much a pure platformer. This is another game that's just okay. It's definitely not bad, but you're not really missing anything if you haven't played it. Some people like to compare this one to the first Sonic game, but this is nowhere near as interesting as that one. Having said that though, it's a perfectly okay game. Next there's Tasmania. In this game, the player takes a viewpoint behind Tas as he runs and dodges stuff, so this plays like a racing game. A very boring racing game.  I don't even know what else to say here. There's just not much going on. I guess this could be a fun speedrun game for some people, otherwise I'd avoid this one. Tiny Toon Adventures Buster Bust Loose is another Konami game, and it's a game I've talked about a ton on this channel over the years. It's a great looking game that captures the look of the show perfectly. The music is familiar and well done, and the main gameplay mechanic is something a little different with a sprint meter that's used to climb walls. There's varying objectives throughout the six levels, like feeding dizzy devil in this boss fight here, and there's some inventive level design here as well. I'd put this one on par with the Disney Capcom games in that it's short and not particularly challenging, but it's still a fun playthrough today, and it's still a cheap cartridge. I'd put this one right alongside stuff like Aladdin and Mickey's Magical Quest. The Tiny Toon series got a second game titled Wacky Sports Challenge, also made by Konami, and this one is a surprise. It's a series of seven mini games where you pick from four different characters from the show to compete in events like a test of strength, a top-down obstacle course, bungee jumping, stuff like that. The best part being that it's four-player compatible, making it easily one of the most accessible four-player games the SNES has to offer. What I like about these games is that they're not just mashing buttons, they're predicated on some kind of skill or timing, so each game is actually somewhat interesting. So yeah, if you're looking for a good four-player game or even just a multiplayer game to play with your kids, Tiny Toon Adventure's Wacky Sports Challenge is a great choice. Alright, that's all of them. In my opinion, the three best games here are the two Tiny Toons games and Looney Toons B-Ball, although I do have a soft spot for Bugs Bunny Rabbit Rampage. And that's all for now. I want to thank you for watching, and I hope you have a great rest of your day.