tagged w/ Environmental Justice
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From the house where he was born, Henry Clark can stand in his back yard and see plumes pouring out of one of the biggest oil refineries in the United States. As a child, he was fascinated by the factory on the hill, all lit up at night like the hellish twin of a fairy tale city. In the morning, he'd go out to play and find the leaves on the trees burned to a crisp. "Sometimes I'd find the air so foul, I'd have to grab my nose and run back into the house until it cleared up," he said.
The refinery would burn off excess gases, sending "energy and heat waves that would rock our house like we were caught in an earthquake," recalled Clark, 68. When the area was engulfed in black smoke for up to a week after one accident, "nobody came to check on the health of North Richmond."
With all of the frequent explosions and fires that sent children fleeing schools, parks and a swimming pool within a mile of the refinery, "we just hoped that nothing happened that would blow everybody up,'' Clark said. "People still wonder when the next big accident is going to happen.”
For 100 years, people, mostly blacks, have lived next door to the booming Chevron Richmond Refinery built by Standard Oil, a plant so huge it can process 240,000 barrels of crude oil a day. Hundreds of tanks holding millions of barrels of raw crude dot 2,900 acres of property on a hilly peninsula overlooking the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay. Five thousand miles of pipeline there move gasoline, jet fuel, diesel and other chemical products.
During World War II, African Americans like Clark's family moved to homes in the shadow of this refinery because they had nowhere else to go. Coming to California looking for opportunity, they quickly learned that white neighborhoods and subdivisions didn't want them.
The people of Richmond live within a ring of five major oil refineries, three chemical companies, eight Superfund sites, dozens of other toxic waste sites, highways, two rail yards, ports and marine terminals where tankers dock. The city of 103,701 doesn't share the demographic of San Francisco, 25 miles to the south, or even Contra Costa County, or the state as a whole.
In North Richmond – the tiny, unincorporated neighbor of Richmond – Latinos, blacks and Asians make up 97 percent of the 3,717 residents, compared with 82.9 percent in Richmond and 59.9 percent in California, according to 2010 U.S. Census figures.
The people of Richmond live within a ring of five oil refineries, three chemical plants, eight Superfund sites, dozens of other toxic waste sites, highways, two rail yards, ports and marine terminals.Most houses sell for below $100,000, among the lowest prices in the Bay Area, in the zip code shared with the Chevron refinery, and residents complain of a lack of paved streets, lighting and basic services. Short on jobs and long on poverty, there's not a grocery store or cafe in sight. The median income in North Richmond, $36,875 in 2010, is less than Richmond's modest $54,012 and less than half of Contra Costa County’s $78,385.
Low-income residents seeking affordable homes end up sharing a fence line with a refinery and a cluster of other polluting businesses. They may save money on shelter, but they pay the price in health, researchers say.
Decades of toxic emissions from industries – as well as lung-penetrating diesel particles spewed by truck routes and rail lines running next door to neighborhoods – may be taking a toll on residents’ health. The people of Richmond, particularly African Americans, are at significantly higher risk of dying from heart disease and strokes and more likely to go to hospitals for asthma than other county residents. Health experts say their environment likely is playing a major role.
More at the linkFrom the house where he was born, Henry Clark can stand in his back yard and see... more
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Yesterday, an Ecuadorian appellate court upheld a historic $18 billion award against Chevron for the company's deliberate contamination of the Ecuadorian Amazon. The decision is the largest environmental award ever handed down and the result of an 18-year legal battle brought by some 30,000 indigenous peoples and farmers seeking a clean up of contaminated sites, clean drinking water, and health care.
Amazon Watch and Rainforest Action Network, which have spent years fighting on the side of the Ecuadorians in their effort to hold Chevron accountable for these egregious environmental crimes and human rights abuses, release the following statement in response to the verdict:
"For a second time, in a jurisdiction of its own choosing, Chevron was found guilty of widespread oil contamination in Ecuador's Amazon. It is a historic triumph for the thousands of victims who have suffered for over four decades from Chevron's drill-and-dump practices.
"Yesterday's ruling, based in large part on Chevron's own evidence, once again proves that the company is responsible for deliberately dumping billions of gallons of toxic waste sludge into local streams and rivers, which thousands depend on for drinking, bathing, and fishing, and created a public health crisis in the rainforest region.
"Chevron has spent more than a decade and hundreds of millions of dollars in a vain attempt to evade accountability and in doing so exacerbating the suffering of thousands of rainforest residents. The company says it will continue deploying its armies of lawyers with yet more legal stonewalling tactics, still hoping that its unlimited resources can outspend and outlast the course of justice. But the guilty verdict sends a loud and clear message: It is time for Chevron to clean up the Ecuadorian Amazon."
The Ecuador decision comes at a time when Chevron also faces criminal charges and fines up to U.S. $11 billion in Brazil for its negligence in its operations. If convicted, the company will be permanently banned from doing business in the South American country.
More at the linkYesterday, an Ecuadorian appellate court upheld a historic $18 billion award against... more
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Permanent Peoples' Tribunal accuses biotech giants Monsanto, Dow, Bayer, Syngenta, DuPont and BASF of promoting dangerous pesticides including endosulfan, paraquat and neonicotinoids
The world's major agrochemical companies, Monsanto, Dow, Bayer, Syngenta, DuPont and BASF, will face a public tribunal in early December accused of systematic human rights violations.
They are accused of violating more than 20 instruments of international human rights law through promoting reliance on the sale and use of dangerous and unsafe pesticides including endosulfan, paraquat and neonicotinoids.
The Permanent Peoples' Tribunal (PPT), an international opinion tribunal created in 1979, will hear expert testimony from scientists, medical doctors and lawyers to prove the charges. Victims who have been injured by these products - from farmers, farmworkers, mothers and consumers from around the world - will also testify to the causes and nature of their injuries.
The cases will be heard over a four-day trial in Bangalore, India beginning December 3. While the Tribunal has no legal weight, and cannot force sanctions on companies, it aims to expose and raise awareness of large-scale human rights violations.
Pesticides Action Network (PAN) International, a global network comprised of 600 organisations in 90 countries, has spent years collecting information to bring about the indictments and is seeking justice for more than 25 specific cases - such as Silvino Talavera, an 11-year-old from Paraguay who died days after breathing in a cloud of Monsanto's RoundUp herbicide sprayed by a crop duster. The trial will also hear evidence of the link between pesticide use and a decline in bees.
The corporations, known as the 'Big 6' control 74 per cent of the global pesticide market, as well as dominating the global seed market.
Bayer reject the allegations saying they are a 'wholesale distortion of the role of pesticides in our society.' Monsanto, Syngenta and Dow, after being contacted by the Ecologist, were unavailable for comment.
Pesticide poisonings
An estimated 355,000 people are believed to die each year from unintentional toxic chemical poisoning, according the World Health Organization, many of these from use or exposure to pesticides and other agrochemicals. Nick Mole from PAN UK said the trial would give a voice to the otherwise voiceless victims of pesticides.
‘The pesticide industry is massive and incredibly powerful. It is difficult to prove corporate manslaughter even when these products are killing hundreds of people a year,' he said. ‘We've spoken to people who have been abused and we are allowing them to give voice to their individual stories. We will be presenting the outcome of the Tribunal to the corporations and will be inviting their response,' he said.
It is hoped that the verdict, to be delivered on December 6, will lead to greater discussions at UN institutions on holding agrochemical corporations accountable for crimes relating to the impact of their products.
More at the linkPermanent Peoples' Tribunal accuses biotech giants Monsanto, Dow, Bayer,... more
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Mrs Maathai was cremated in a casket made of bamboo, water hyacinth and papyrus so that no trees would be cut down
A state funeral for Nobel Peace Prize winner and environmentalist Wangari Maathai has taken place at a Kenyan national park she fought to save.
Mrs Maathai, whose Green Belt Movement planted an estimated 45 million trees in Kenya, died last month of cancer.
Thousands of mourners lined the route of the procession to the funeral in Uhuru National Park in Nairobi.
President Mwai Kibaki praised her courage, tenacity and "selfless service to the nation".
Mrs Maathai, who died on 25 September, was the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, in 2004. She won the award for her campaigns to promote conservation, women's rights and transparent government.
Global legacy
Mrs Maathai was the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize
Because she opposed cutting down trees, her remains were placed in a bamboo-frame coffin, made of water hyacinth and papyrus reeds and draped with a Kenyan flag. After the funeral, she was cremated at a private ceremony.
"The best way we can honour her is to carry on the great work she started especially in the fields of environmental conservation, social justice, human rights and democracy," President Kibaki told the crowd at Uhuru Park, where Mrs Maathai once campaigned to stop the construction of an office tower.
In 2008, Mrs Maathai was tear-gassed at a protest against President Kibaki's plan to increase the number of ministers in his cabinet.
snip
She became known as the Tree Mother of Africa.
More at the linkMrs Maathai was cremated in a casket made of bamboo, water hyacinth and papyrus so... more
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In July I attended a public debate in London on the potential for REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) to make international forestry more just. The debate brought together a wide variety of stakeholders in REDD in order to assess its possibilities and its frailties. The panel leading the discussion included John Vidal from the Guardian and representatives from DFID, ODI, and FERN among others. What became increasingly clear during the debate is that although the international community appeared to be pushing on with REDD, it remains a highly contested and confused idea.
For those still unsure of what the initiative is, REDD is an effort to create a financial value for the carbon stored in forests. It offers incentives for developing countries to reduce emissions from forested lands and invest in low-carbon paths to sustainable development. However, the discussion highlighted fears that REDD may perpetuate, or even deepen, forest people’s historical dispossession from their forests.
The discussion focused on the concept of justice within REDD and the focal point of the evening turned out to be “local justice”. The question was - what is happening to the local people on the ground where these initiatives are implemented? It became increasingly clear, by hearing arguments from members of FERN and from those on the ground, that it is forest people that often are the ones who are most negatively affected by these projects. There is an overriding fear that REDD may not be dissimilar to other big money projects affecting the forests. For instance, a member of the audience, who had worked on a REDD project in Peru, stated that it was seen as more dangerous than palm oil plantations. The fear is that these projects can potentially, and almost by nature, take over entire forests, leaving indigenous people to lose the land earmarked for these REDD projects.
During the evening, several other members of the audience stated it was governments, and not large corporations, who were taking control of the forests. The ODI representative feared that REDD projects will reaffirm the ownership of the forests by the state. For example, as the government controls the carbon it trades, the forests fall under their control. This will go on to reinforce highly centralized, top down decision-making, something GBM works to move away from.
The panel was in agreement about what must be done, forest peoples and local communities must be included and able to make decisions for the future of forests in all REDD projects. Increasing evidence from Brazil and elsewhere indicates that tenure reform, that is placing control of forest resources into the hands of indigenous and other forest-dependent communities, contributes to local well-being and forest protection.
More at the linkIn July I attended a public debate in London on the potential for REDD (Reducing... more
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The trial of six green campaigners has collapsed after an undercover policeman who had infiltrated their group switched sides and has offered to give evidence on their behalf.The six were charged with conspiring to shut down the Ratcliffe-on-Soar power station in Nottingham in 2009.The trial was due to start today, but it had to be abandoned after Mark Kennedy contacted the defence team to say he would be prepared to help the six defendants.As a result the prosecution had to drop their case.Long-haired Kennedy infiltrated the green movement in Nottingham in 2003. He was known to those within it as Mark "Flash" Stone, having earned the nickname because he always seemed to have more money than the other activists.He lived a double life as Mark Kennedy of the Metropolitan Police and as Mark Stone, green activist, based in Nottingham for over seven years before now crumbling to the pressures.Danny Chivers, who was one of the six defendants in the failed case, said Kennedy was not just an observer, but an agent provocateur in their activism."We're not talking about someone sitting at the back of the meeting taking notes - he was in the thick of it."In October 2010, Kennedy was confronted by some of the activists after they found documents which revealed his true identity.He admitted he had been a Met Police officer and had infiltrated their organisations, before then disappearing.Ratcliffe-on-Soar was one of many actions in Britain and across Europe which Kennedy was involved in, including the protests against the G8 summit at Gleneagles in 2005 which helped give birth to the Climate Camp movement.Activist websites are full of condemnations of Kennedy by former close friends.There is some abuse, but most say they feel "violated", "betrayed" and "sickened".
Ratcliffe-on-Soar power station Twenty people were convicted over the Ratcliffe-on-Soar case last year.One writes: "He must be a deeply conflicted individual."When confronted, Kennedy told the activists he left the police after the Nottingham arrests in 2009. It is unclear whether this is true, or where he is now.The Met Police are refusing to comment officially on Kennedy and would not say whether or not he is still a police officer.
The trial of six green campaigners has collapsed after an undercover policeman who... more
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THE REAL NEWS NETWORK ~ http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=6037
30,000 indigenous Ecuadorians fight for compensation against Texaco (now Chevron), accused of 3 decades of massive toxic dumping in the Amazon. The damage long done... We watch today as the indigenous people of that land stand up to Chevron to get restitution for their destroyed environment after Chevron's/Texaco's decades of open deliberate ecological misdeeds.
What do we all get in return?
We get to watch another text book example on how Large Corporations avoid doing the honorable thing and correct their past actions and misdeeds. We see a powerful corporation use every means possible to corrupt the legal the system, so Chevron can walk away from the ecological disaster destroyed lives and they created as they sucked-up $$$ billions of dollars of Ecuadorian Oil.
This is how Corporations Do Business...? = YES
This is how Corporations Should do Business...? = NO
We need to clean - up the way our Governments and our Corporations do business!
We need to DEMAND TRANSPARENCY and Personal Responsibility in both our Governments and in our Corporations.THE REAL NEWS NETWORK ~... more
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Monsanto and the pro-genetic engineering lobby received a severe blow in the highest German court. The Federal Constitutional Court in Germany reaffirmed on November 24, 2010 that the German precautionary GE law in Germany was constitutional. The Court also acknowledged the unknown long-term risks of genetically modified organisms (GMOs).
Monsanto Legal Attack
In 2005, one of Germany’s 16 federal states - Saxony Anhalt - supported by a lawyer from Monsanto (Freshfield &Co) - challenged the German GE legislation. In particular, they targeted the existing rigorous liability rules and the mandatory public register on the locations where GE crops are grown. Pro-GE lobbists claimed that these legal provisions prevented farmers from planting GE crops and therefore violated the constitution.
After 5 years of legal proceedings, Germany’s highest court reaffirmed that the long-term risks of GMOs are unknown given the current lack of scientific data. Therefore, the German government has an obligation to act cautiously in regards to the preservation of nature for future generations.
In its decision, the court repeatedly stated that GE alters the very structure of life that could have irreversible effects. Therefore, the high level of precaution surrounding the cultivation and the commercialisation of GMO products is perfectly legitimate.
GE Register
One of the targets of the legal challenge was the mandatory and public register for the locations of fields with GE crops. The court confirmed that this register was very important and legitimate in the context of a democratic and pluralistic society. For the court, the register was also a means to inform society and contribute to the process of public debate.
Strict Liability
Another issue under challenge was Germany’s strict liability rules. In Germany, a farmer that cultivates GE crop is considered responsible if the planted GE crops contaminate the neighboring fields. The German Federal Constitutional Court sustained these strict liability rules and also specifically identified GE crops as having negative impacts for GE-free agriculture.
The court decision is also perfectly in sync with the recent agreement at the United Nations meeting on Biosafety that took place in Nagoya (Japan). Countries can now adopt their own national liability regime on GE to fulfill the objectives of the Biosafety Protocol.
This court decision in Germany and the agreement in Nagoya should encourage other countries to adopt similar strict liability rules to prevent GE contamination.Monsanto and the pro-genetic engineering lobby received a severe blow in the highest... more
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Chevron thinks they can get away with changing their image in light of their abuses in Ecuador. This site beats them to the punch, and now you can too.Chevron thinks they can get away with changing their image in light of their abuses in... more
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A group of 70 no global activists on Monday staged a lightening strike against a field of genetically modified (GM) maize, crushing all the plants and effectively preventing their harvest.
The GM crop at Vivaro, near the northeastern town of Pordenone, has been at the centre of a storm for the last two weeks, after the farmer who planted the maize, Giorgio Fidenato, announced it was ready to be harvested.
Some 70 activists, dressed alike in white overalls, were able to stomp on all the plants before police arrived and dragged them away, a spokesman for the Ya Basta anti-GM group said.
"Our action was aimed against the violence that GM crops wreak on the environment and on humans," said Luca Tornatore.
Despite widespread opposition to GM crops by most Italian farmers, the action was nevertheless roundly condemned by all. Pro-biotech group Futuragra said the raid was "an act of vandalism" and the result of "terror sown by the media" against GM crops. Farmers' union Coldiretti, which actively campaigns for organic agriculture, blasted the anti-globalists, saying that "the law must always be respected".
But Coldiretti also criticised officials for having dallied on the issue. Last week several members of the largest opposition group, the centre-left Democratic Party (PD), joined MPs of the governing coalition's rightwing Northern League party at a press conference outside the Senate to protest the lack of an "effective response" to the situation at Vivaro.
An umbrella organization coordinating efforts against the crops, the Task Force for an Italy Free of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs), which represents 27 conservation, farming and environmental associations, called for the "immediate destruction of fields where GM maize is grown".
It warned of a "devastating impact on the local environment, wild fauna and the crops of other farmers" if pollen from the maize was allowed to disperse.
Greenpeace attempted to storm the field last week and numerous representatives from the GMO-Free Italy Task Force erected a protest camp next to the land.
The governor of Friuli Venezia Giulia where Vivaro is located, Renzo Tondo, has vowed that the law will be upheld and any infringements will be dealt with swiftly.
The president of the neighbouring region of Veneto, former Italian agriculture minister Gianluca Zaia, voiced support for Greenpeace, warning that cross-contamination from the crop could have a catastrophic effect on local agriculture.
Agriculture Minister Giancarlo Galan condemned Monday's raid, likening it to attacks carried out by Fascist thugs.
"I hope police will identify those who took part in it because they are a group of violent and intolerant thugs of the worst sort," he said, stressing that officials had been working with local authorities to analyse the crops.
Fidenato, who heads the pro-biotech Federated Farmers (AF) association, claims he acted lawfully in planting the seeds and likened GMO critics to Nazis "with their irrational fears of biological-racial contamination of the plant species".
Although there is no outright ban on the cultivation of GM crops in Italy, a long-running legal tangle effectively prevents farmers from doing so.
Farmers are technically allowed to grow GM crops provided they first obtain permission under procedures to be drafted by the agriculture ministry.
However, these procedures have never been finalized.
After months of foot dragging, a 2006 ministry circular eventually halted the drafting process entirely until regional governments agreed on local measures to prevent cross-contamination between GM and traditional crops.
But four years on, regional governments have still not agreed on definitive coexistence measures and, despite a January court ruling ordering the ministry to finalize the authorization procedures anyway, it has not yet done so.
Fidenato started lobbying local officials to allow him to plant GM crops in 2007 but received no reply.
"At this point, since they haven't said no, I take it I can go ahead," he said, shortly after announcing he had planted the GM maize earlier this year.
The issue of GM crops is particularly explosive in Italy.
As the second-largest producer of organic crops in Europe and the fourth largest in the world, there is widespread fear of the potential damage resulting from accidental GM contamination.
Coldiretti has issued several reports suggesting that widespread public hostility to GM crops would not only damage the domestic market for farm produce but would also result in a 60% drop in exports.A group of 70 no global activists on Monday staged a lightening strike against a field... more
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Live coverage...
WASHINGTON (AP)- BP's humbled CEO told Congress on Thursday he was "deeply sorry" for the company's catastrophic oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. But a House panel chairman accused him of being oblivious to the risks of the company's deepwater operations.
Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., told a grim-faced BP executive Tony Hayward that in his committee's review of 30,000 items, there was "not a single e-mail or document that you paid even the slightest attention to the dangers at this well."
A day after agreeing to a $20 billion victims' compensation fund, Hayward told Congress in prepared testimony that he was "personally devastated" by the April explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig that triggered the giant spill -- and that he understands the anger that Americans feel toward him and his company.Live coverage...
WASHINGTON (AP)- BP's humbled CEO told Congress on Thursday... more
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The grand opening of the EcoCenter at Heron's Head Park is set to jump off the 40th anniversary of Earth Day. On Sunday, April 18 Literacy for Environmental Justice (LEJ) will be holding its 10th Annual People's Earth Day celebration to throw open the doors of one of the first environmental justice education centers of its kind anywhere. In San Francisco, one of the greenest cities in America, a grassroots environmental justice youth empowerment organization is about to raise its proverbial green roof on a virtually carbon neutral building meant for environmental education of its own and the greater community. To be located in Bayview Hunters Point, a neighborhood with a toxic legacy, the EcoCenter and its signature reclaimed aluminum Great Blue Heron which was sculpted, melted, and poured by District youth could become a symbol of self-determination for a community that like the phoenix medallion on Coit Tower at Telegraph Hill is on a meteoric rise out of the ashes of the implosion of a former PG & E power plant whose site is less than a football field away. As a staff educator noted, just over a century later on the anniversary of the Great 1906 San Francisco Earthquake, a small non-profit funded by government funders and private donations is going to shake things up in the southeast corner of this city full of hybrid cars and locavores by showing the world that a few youth with green jobs can harness the fire of the sun to think globally and act locally.
http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/Solar-powered-classroom-about-to-make-debut-90535939.html
http://www.earthday.org/events/10th-annual-peoples-earth-day-grand-opening-ecology-education-center
www.lejyouth.orgThe grand opening of the EcoCenter at Heron's Head Park is set to jump off the... more
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A youth group, Youth United for Community Action (YUCA), gets environmental justice after many battles by getting Romic, a known toxic polluter, banned from doing business in California.
http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2010/02/18/18638063.phpA youth group, Youth United for Community Action (YUCA), gets environmental justice... more
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Chevron is piling on the lobbyists and PR firms in an extraordinary effort to evade responsibility for its massive toxic contamination of the Ecuadorian Amazon. In solidarity with the rainforest communities of Ecuador, and all communities where Chevron and its allies seek to put profit ahead of people and the planet, we must say "no more."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/han-shan/oil-giant-chevron-accused_b_368076.htmlChevron is piling on the lobbyists and PR firms in an extraordinary effort to evade... more
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We are the Organic movement!
Organic agriculture and beyond can combat deforestation, soil, water and air contamination,water scarcity,hunger, poverty,energy consumption,economic injustice,illnesses,desertification,climate change,species extinction and the subjugation of human rights.
No GMO, no toxicity.
One with our beautiful blue planet, we advocate justice,respect for our Health and Nature, hoping to restore its harmonious balance and biodiversity.
Discuss, create solutions and take action.
Thank you from my heart to all that did join and will.
Thanks to Current.com
Watch the video below.
Join ORGANIC:
http://current.com/groups/organicgreen/We are the Organic movement!
Organic agriculture and beyond can combat deforestation,... more
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Lauren Whitehead's spoken word performance of Whiplash got the Herbst Theater in San Francisco on its feet tonight in a standing ovation at the 10th Annual Brower Youth Award ceremonies. It will make you stand up, too.Lauren Whitehead's spoken word performance of Whiplash got the Herbst Theater in... more
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Chadwick Matlin writes...
"Years before it was announced that Van Jones, the premier green-jobs advocate in the country, was headed to the White House, it was clear that Van Jones was headed to the White House. Thomas Friedman devoted an entire 2007 column to Jones, writing of his lofty goals, "I would not underestimate him." Jones muscled his way through Congress to get a Green Jobs Act passed in 2007 and then lavished praise on Nancy Pelosi and now-Labor Secretary, then-Rep. Hilda Solis. Pelosi returned the favor with a rave book blurb for Jones' 2008 best-seller The Green Collar Economy, writing that Jones possessed "sparkling intelligence, powerful vision, and deep empathy." When he wasn't running his fix-poverty, fix-the-planet nonprofit in Oakland, Calif., he was seeding Obama's transition team with ideas for an all-encompassing environmental/labor/energy/economic plan that would push the country toward a green future. After The New Yorker ran a glowing yet thorough profile of Jones in January, his ascendancy was complete. By the time the green-jobs-heavy stimulus bill passed, Jones may as well have been in the White House, since his philosophy had infected the place
So despite originally saying he had no interest in moving to Washington, Jones is now part of the executive branch. Officially, he's the "special adviser for green jobs, enterprise, and innovation," a clunky title unbefitting of a man so who's especially talented at turning a phrase. Basically, he's Obama's green-jobs guy. But he's the green-jobs guy who used to be the green-jobs advocate. When I spent the day with him in Washington last week, Jones told me he sees the transition as one of "inspiration to implementation." It's a slogan that summarizes not just Jones' challenge but the whole administration's. The trouble for both: Inspiration is the easy part...."Chadwick Matlin writes...
"Years before it was announced that Van Jones, the... more
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leahl
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One of the most evil schemes concocted for businesses to legally steal the land from under the feet of poor farmers for their own profit. This is what is causing rising food costs and world hunger, and it is being exacerbated by the very organizations and corporations that claim they want to feed the world. The only world they wish to feed is their own. This is a stark look at what we are up against in preserving food freedom and environmental democracy. Permaculture, sustainable agriculture, and bringing land back to local farmers to plant the food they need to live instead of being indebted to the World Bank and WTO is what will save the world from hunger and famine and preserve biodiversity and healthy soil. Not Monsanto and Cargill. It is time to lift the veil on this atrocity and human rights abuse.One of the most evil schemes concocted for businesses to legally steal the land from... more
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From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view.From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects... more
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GRITtv
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