Newscast video of Andres Speaking live about Barack Obama

Here's the link:

http://www.mega.tv/EkEFEFkZVVutcLgLMP.html

It will stream in windows media, I'll try to upload a flash version at some point.

Here are some stills and a rough transcrīpt English translation for non-Spanish speakers:

Maria Regina:

And now we go to Los Angeles where

we have singer-songwriter Andres Useche who supports

Barack Obama and demonstrates it clearly with a

song he composed about the senator.

Welcome Andres, tell us what drew you to Barack Obama's candidacy?

Andres:

Thank you Maria Regina, the first thing that made a big impression on me was his early opposition to the war in Iraq. He displayed very sound judgment regarding the global situation when he foresaw what would happen there and also what would happen with Al Qaeda in the surrounding countries, also I thought he came across as a very honest person, who, for example, defended Latinos in front of a predominately African-American audience at Martin Luther King's church, as well as in the debates seen around the world, which led me to believe that he wasn't just fishing for the votes of whatever audience happened to be in front of him, but that he stood for what he believed was right, which is that we should accept the great diversity in this country and around the world, and reach a greater understanding among all nations and that he was communicating this attitude to the different groups.

And regarding the economy, he's shown he doesn't want to just put a temporary band-aid

to try to solve our grave problems which include the gasoline prices rising, and the economy declining, but he wants to follow through with a true energy revolution which is possible and he's figured out how to pay for, it seems to me that he can accomplish it if we all get involved. An important aspect of Barack Obama's candidacy is that he has brought in a lot of people into the fold that were never part of this process, like me, I never thought I would get involved politically, I was more or less well informed but a figure like him, honest, clear and eloquent, was needed to galvanize this young community from around the US who are struggling and are the ones who are going to make sure that all these promises are kept.

Camilo: I want to ask you, sorry to interrupt you... You've made an extraordinarily positive analysis of Obama, but we have to remind of viewers, to provide full disclosure, that Mr. Obama is in favor of building the wall along the US, Mexico border and that he would require that illegal immigrants learn English as a condition to legalize their situation. But aside from that, I want to ask you how how it's going for you with this song for Obama, popularity-wise...

Maria Regina:

Yeah because, it's one thing to support

(Camilo: Is that a fly? It's John McCain. McCain sent a fly in here! LAUGHTER)

It's one thing to support a candidate but to actually write a song for him and put it out there is something else, how is it going with that?

Andres:

The truth is that I'm not the only one, and it's to Barack Obama's credit that he's inspired so many of us to use whatever talents or abilities we have to push this movement forward. It's also important to mention, regarding what you said before about immigration, that we have two options right now, Barack Obama and John McCain.

And as you can see McCain has devolved, he has regressed to the far right to cater to that group with xenophobic, we could say, anti-immigrant tendencies, his perspective has changed so much, so sincerely I think, right now the clear choice, for us Latinos is Barack Obama.

Maria Regina:

Andres, to return to Camilo's question... is it going well with the song?

Camilo:

Have they played it on the radio?

Andres:

They have played it on the radio, and there are opportunities for me to write other songs for other causes I think are very important, but to me more than a professional accomplishment I had something to say and had to find a way to say it,

Often times we think we can't do anything, we let cynicism overcome us and we stay static, and truth is that there is so much we can do, whether you can sing or not, if you can stand up and join a group, it doesn't have to be Barack Obama's, whoever it is that you support, I think every person has the power to do something, make a call, invite or take someone to vote, it is something very important we can do, to get involved to achieve a better democracy.

Camilo (to Maria Regina):

It's cool that young people are doing this uh? People say that young people are apathetic, but here's an example of the youth getting involved in the electoral process.

Maria Regina:

And it's very true, what he is saying that no matter who you are going for, it's important to come out, to vote and that our voice is heard. Andres, I think that if someone from the Obama campaign is listening to us right now, they should get in touch with you, really.

Camilo:

Or from McCain's, you never know.

Andres:

No, no, not McCain.

Camilo:

No, but if democracy...

Maria Regina (to Camilo):

But it became perfectly clear that McCain isn't... at least to him... isn't an option.

Camilo:

I'm just saying... they might say they didn't like that, and they would like another...

Andres:

Maybe another against McCain.

Camilo:

Thank you very much

Andres:

You welcome, thank you Camilo and Maria

--

Upon watching it I also realize that I should have found a way to talk about my collaborators, Eric Byler, Warren Fu, Annabel Park, Loni Pham etc... or at least bring up the name of our song which the anchors never mentioned... but I'm happy I got out some of the more important stuff i wanted to say.

Go Obama