a bright vision for the future-- essential reading

from symposia books in providence, RI (a wonderful bookstore we discovered a few years ago), a book i want to get... i briefly knew chris carlsson (friend of a friend) when i lived in san francisco in the mid 90s, he started the critical mass bike ride phemon, every friday in the city...

Chris Carlsson, the author, will be at symposia on monday may 19th for an in-store reading...

Nowtopia: How Pirate Programmers, Outlaw Bicyclists, and Vacant-lot Gardeners are inventing the Future Today!

"Chris Carlsson is one of our most original and compelling voices of radical social change in America. Nowtopia opens a window onto today's vibrant subcultures of technical experimentation and cooperative work, in everything from biofuels to bicycling, gardening to the webworld. More than tinkerers and bohemians, these renegade innovators are pioneers of new ways of living beyond the market and ordinary jobs. Carlsson moves effortlessly from tales of personal liberation to a trenchant analysis of the reconfiguration of class. Nowtopia is a ringing appeal for the liberation of human creativity from the noose of wagework--before it's too late."

-Richard Walker, Prof. of Geography, University of California, Berkeley, Author of The Capitalist Imperative

The Story of Stuff

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. The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It'll teach you something, it'll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever.

Watch the 20 minute video - it will change the way you view the world. Just click and the video will start. "If everyone consumed at U.S. Rates we would need 3-5 planets. We only have one."

Verizon is Apparently Anti-Choice

Apparently Verizon Wireless won't let its customers voluntarily sign up for texts from NARAL Pro-Choice America. Why you ask? Because the organization is "controversial" and "unsavory."

Take a moment of your time to find out about this censorship and take action.

I vote we follow the suggestion of the women of feministing.com and:

So I have a request to all of you with Verizon cell phones: text all of your friends with Verizon cell phones, "Abortion should be legal and uncensored." Then have them forward it on and cancel their account.

UPDATED:
From NARAL:

Verizon confirmed in a letter to Keenan that it had accepted NARAL Pro-Choice America’s application for a text-messaging short code. NARAL Pro-Choice America is also requesting that Verizon make its new policy public so that its customers can be assured that the corporation will not engage in similar censorship activities in the future.

Wishing Global Warming To Go Away Will Not Make It So

"It has been declared at risk by conservation groups. Yet rich Westerners are paying thousands of dollars for the privilege of shooting an animal whose very existence is already threatened by environmental disaster. Geoffrey Lean reports from Ilulissat, Greenland, on a fight for survival."

In an article in the Independent by Geoffrey Lean on September 9, 2007 Lean says Polar Bears are looming toward disaster by 2050, headed to extinction. Who found this leftist, extremist viewpoint you ask? Greenpeace? The Sierra Club? Nope. The reactionary U.S. government. Lean says:

The development comes at the end of the most momentous week in the human history of the Arctic, which is warming faster than anywhere else in the world. Satellite observations have revealed that its ice has shrunk to much its lowest ever level, raising fears that it had reached a "tipping point" where it would melt irreversibly, disappearing altogether in summer in less than 25 years, with incalculable global consequences...

Meanwhile an investigation has found that polar bears are being shot in alarming numbers by "rich trophy hunters from the US, Europe and Japan," even as their increasingly fragile habitat melts beneath them. Only in an Alice in Wonderland age would we be shooting a near extinct environmental icon for a trophy while we are on the verge of environmental disaster. At the same time the U.S. Geological Survey concluded that the world population of Polar Bears would be cut by two-thirds by the middle of the century as the result of the melting of the ice. Lean says: this is likely to be over-optimistic because, as the survey itself admits, it is based on estimates of the rate of the ice's disappearance that fall far short of what is actually taking place."

The Arctic crisis has become so compelling that leaders of the world's main religions gathered this weekend on the iceberg-studded sea off this small town, deep in the Arctic Circle on the west Greenland coast, to pray for the planet. Bartholomew I, the Ecumenical Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox church - who convened the group - told them: "the danger of an avoidable catastrophe is now more acute than ever." On Friday senior representatives of the Roman Catholic and protestant churches, Sunni and Shia Islam, and the Hebrew, Hindu, Shinto and Buddhist Zen religions joined the Patriarch in silent prayer on the prow of a liner under a lowering sky in the shadow of giant icebergs.

Unfortunately, prayer is not what we need. What we need is action. We can pray all we want about this crisis; people of different faiths coming together is a good thing in this fractured age in which we live, however the only measure that will save our dear planet from disaster is radical change now.

Robert Corell, who heads the world's main monitoring project on the region - the international Arctic Climate Impact Assessment - said the melting was becoming "catastrophic", and experts increasingly fear that it is approaching the point where the disappearance of the entire icecap becomes inevitable. That would raise sea-levels worldwide by over 20 feet, inundating coastal cities.

Last week the US National Snow and Ice Data Centre in Denver, Colorado, announced that the sea ice had shrunk to 2.05 million square miles in August 2007; its previous record low was 2.14 million square miles two years ago. It means that a staggering 200,000 sq miles of ice is now open sea for the first time. This year the fabled Northwest Passage through northern Canada opened, while the North-east Passage around Siberia is blocked by just a single tongue of ice. Scientists expect that they will both shortly open simultaneously, making it possible to sail round the North Pole for the first time...

These are facts, not global warming theory. Global warming is not coming. It is here. Congress recently passed Clean Energy Legislation which is certainly a start. Go to the truthout environment page for more information and action.

Tell The MSM to Get With It!

For some reason today I hit my limit on the Jena 6 injustice and had to do something. Being trapped in DC, I felt my only option was to write the Washington Post.

This is what I sent to them:

I am saddened that the only story in the Post of the injustice in Jena, La., has been about the reduction of one of the students' charges (thankfully) with no mention of the injustice behind the charges. What happened to the teens in Jena is indicative of the larger race relations problem we have in the U.S. This country is sharply divided, which is extremely obvious in the District.

The facts in Jena, La.: There is a "whites only" tree on school property; school officials described nooses tied to trees as a "prank"; and the District Attorney told six teenagers "I can be your best fried or your worst enemy...I can take away your lives with a stroke of my pen".

Has the U.S. really come to a point where all it cares about is the wronging of white lacrosse players, the kidnappings/murders of white women and suburban school tragedies? What happened in Jena is worthy of national news coverage.

The legal system has failed these young Americans, and it appears so has the mainstream media. If you would like some information on the story so that you can share with Washingtonians what is happening in America's south, visit www.colorofchange.com/jena.

Well it turns out that the Post had written a fairly decent article on this last Saturday. So I have a feeling the won't be running my letter. However, I encourage each of you to to see if your local paper has run a story and respond to the editor as needed. (Just don't do like I did and search their site for jena 6 instead of jena.)

Here is more information about writing letters to the editor.
Here is some information on the lack of media coverage of this issue.

Racism Rising its Ugly Head in the Deep South

Jena, Lousiana has become the scene of a race trial. I came across an article this morning and it shocked me. A town 220 miles north of New Orleans is embraced in a race trial that hearkens back 50 years to the old south. It began last August when a black student asked the head teacher if he and others could break tradition and sit under a tree during breaks as white students do.

The next day there were three nooses hanging from the tree, a "prank" the school considered a practical joke as did the white students. The white students were given in-school suspensions for what many of the black students considered an open threat. Nooses to black students meant the word "nigger" and lynching which is a time honored horrific tradition in the south.

The following week, Black students staged a protest under the tree. At a school assembly soon after, Jena district attorney Reed Walters, appearing with local police officers, warned Black students against further unrest. “I can make your lives disappear with a stroke of my pen,” he threatened.

Racial tensions broke out in this tiny Louisiana town. Most whites live up on "snob" hill in the town well off, while most of the blacks live in trailers and wooden shacks with rubbish in the streets. The town populations do not mix, but began confronting one another. On December 4th six black students allegedly confronted a white student and assaulted him. Some called the incident a "fist fight." Others describe the incident differently: "In the first weekend of December, a Black student was assaulted by a group of white students, and a white graduate of Jena High School threatened several Black students with a shotgun. The following Monday, white students taunted the Black student who was assaulted over the weekend, and one of the white students was beaten up."

Within hours, six Black students were arrested. “I think the district attorney is pinning it on us to make an example of us,” said Purvis, one of the black students involved. “In Jena, people get accused of things they didn't do a lot.”

Regardless, the black students are now charged with attempted 2nd. degree murder and conspiracy to commit 2nd. degree murder. That same white student was found that night at his baptist church as "his usual smiling self." This is all from a school fight.

Bail was eventually set absurdly high and most of the students have been kept in custody until the trial begins tomorrow. The students face up to 50 years in jail. The prosecutor said in his defense of the charges: 'I will not tolerate this type of behavior. To those who act in this manner I tell you that you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law and with the harshest crimes that the facts justify. When you are convicted I will seek the maximum penalty allowed by law. I will see to it that you never again menace the students at any school in this parish.' He should have added "if you are black" because that is exactly what is happening.

Let justice be served. Thanks to some "outsiders" the NAACP and the ACLU are now involved and aiding in the defense of these young men. The more attention that this town and trial receives the less there is a chance that these young men will be railroaded. Find out for yourself what is going on in the deep south.

Update: I received several messages regarding this incident. I decided to re-post the original article and an update to what happened since. It is getting worse. These kids are being railroaded in what appears to be strictly about race. Do something. Read below.

The first trial ended last month, and Mychal Bell, who has been in prison since December, was convicted of aggravated battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated battery (both felonies) by an all-white jury in a trial where his public defender called no witnesses. During his trial, Mychal's parents were ordered not to speak to the media and the court prohibited protests from taking place near the courtroom or where the judge could see them. Mychal is scheduled to be sentenced on July 31st, and could go to jail for 22 years.

Theo Shaw's trial is next. He will finally make bail this week.The Jena Six are lucky to have parents and loved ones who are fighting tooth and nail to free them. They have been threatened but they are standing strong. We know that if the families have to go it alone, their sons will be a long time coming home. But if we act now, we can make a difference.

Join me in demanding that Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco get involved to make sure that justice is served for Mychal Bell, and that DA Reed Walters drop the charges against the five boys who have not yet gone to trial. Know that the only reason these boys are being prosecuted is because they are black.

Gotta Pay to Play

As someone who has $50k in school debt and a passion for justice, I frequently wish that progressive activist jobs paid considerably more. In fact, because of the lack of scratch attached to these jobs, I went back to get my Masters. At the time, I lived in Austin, Texas, where everyone in progressive politics is over-educated and over-qualified. So you know what that means. Exploitation of the young and politically aware. The land where internships are unpaid and entry-level positions barely hit the $25,000 mark. Ah…doesn’t it feel good to give back to your country?

So you can imagine how I related to the article, After College Ends, So Does Activism. It talks of the canvassing that young progressives are forced to do to break onto the political scene, the lack of health insurance, the shitty hours and the even shittier pay.

What does it mean for our country’s future when we don’t mentor the younger generation and give them an opportunity to learn about politics? The author notes, and I wholeheartedly concur, “The importance of engaging and gainfully employing young progressives is hard to overstate, both for its immediate practicality and the long-term sustainability of the left. By ignoring progressive grads' economic constraints, the progressive movement -- activists and funders -- are squandering an immense opportunity to utilize the ideology, size and energy of the post-graduate generation.”

So, those of you with decision-making abilities start paying better and provide a little health insurance. It’s the least we can do for our future.

Questioning Activism

Howard Zinn spoke at New Haven this past week and his "talk" was dedicated to activism. Why activism is needed and what exactly is activism. I often read Howard Zinn in the Progressive and his book "A People's History of the United States" (he recently updated the book for youth) is on my list of ten books that have to be read.

It got me to thinking as we in Hoboken are coming upon another useless city council election on May 8th. The same people saying the same things election after election.

I have attended every anti-war rally since the talk of war began to spread. The first huge rally occurred in October of 2002 in which I hobbled on a cane to attend...two days after Paul Wellstone was killed, the inspiring Senator from Minnesota. What we are doing isn't working. Going to rallies is important to make our voice heard, but it isn't working. The same people continue to run our country, whether the Democrats or as my friend likes to call them the Rethuglicans. But, they are virtually the same, one far less dangerous admittedly, but let us first understand that globalism became popular under Clinton, he ended welfare, he coalesced the media in the hands of the few, was less than supportive of unions, etc. I could go on for a while.

We need people in government who know the struggles of everyday life, of all races and both genders, not a system that encourages blue blood hackery, corruption and party boss behavior...most people in our country feel that universal health care is needed, that the rich should pay their fair share of taxes and that we should be out of this ghastly war. Yet, none of it occurs and none of it will occur until we stand up as people, as a community and as a nation. It will not be done for us, we must do it ourselves. What are you going to do?

Fear and Consumption

I have always been impressed when I see interviews with Marilyn Manson. I don't particularly like his music, nor do I dislike it. But, he is different and says what is on his mind...which are mostly insightful comments about our culture and how we live. Who can forget in Bowling For Columbine when he boiled down the age we live in to "Fear and Consumption" one of the most powerful moments in a powerful film.

See this interview (both parts) with Henry Rollins on IFC. It is worth it whether you like him or not...he defines our age like no other artist. He makes me think: what I am doing? Is it contributing to society? How can I make a difference? Am I really standing up? How can I do better? There are not many folks today who can inspire me so, but he does it every single time I see him on screen. Henry Rollins is also very good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StuMJcw01T4&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzVMJVdJIIk&mode=related&search=