Thoreauvians

Instead, he believes that money is better spent promoting breakthroughs in the renewable energy sector, once more emphasizing economic responsibility rather than ethical responsibility. Growth in the renewable energy sector means growth in jobs, growth in energy output, and growth in profit. The wind industry alone now employs 75,000 working Americans, supplying residents with more than 50,000 megawatts of electricity (an output equivalent to 50 nuclear plants).  Similar numbers are seen in the solar energy and weatherization industries – a testament to the vitality and potential of the renewable energy sector.

E + ducere: “To lead or draw out.” The etymological Latin roots of “education.” According to a former Jesuit professor of mine, the fundamental sense of the word is to draw others out of “darkness,” into a “more magnanimous view” (he’d say, his arms spread wide). As inspirational as this speech was to a seminar group of budding higher educators, it failed to specify the means by which this might be done, or the reason. Lacking a Jesuit sense of mission, I had to figure out for myself what the “darkness” was, what to lead people towards, and why. It turned out to be simpler than I thought, in some respects, since I concluded that it wasn’t my job to decide these things, but rather to present points of view, a collection of methods—an intellectual toolkit, so to speak—and an enthusiastic model. Then get out of the way. That’s all an educator can, and should do, in my humble opinion. Anything more is not education, it’s indoctrination.

Now the Work of Movements Begins Email    Print    Share x RSS Feed Digg Facebook TwitThis StumbleUpon Reddit YahooBuzz Email BlinkList del.icio.us Fark Furl Google LinkedIn Mixx MyShare NewsVine Propeller SphereIt Technorati http://myweb2.search.yahoo.com/myre

In just the last two months of the campaign, outside groups linked to dirty energy sources or the promotion of a dirty energy agenda spent more than $270 million on TV ads in the presidential, House, and Senate races and industry ads promoting oil, gas, and coal interest, and more than $31 million was spent on energy-related ads, according to a Center for American Progress Action Fund analysis of data from Kantar Media’s CMAG. This includes more than $109 million spent in congressional races with $21.7 million on energy-specific ads. During that time, more than 59,600 spots ran on energy and environmental issues in the presidential race and key House and Senate races.

Why I’m Voting Green Email    Print    Share x RSS Feed Digg Facebook TwitThis StumbleUpon Reddit YahooBuzz Email BlinkList del.icio.us Fark Furl Google LinkedIn Mixx MyShare NewsVine Propeller SphereIt Technorati YahooMyWeb

No matter what the polls or pundits say, it's all about voter turnout and unlikely voters (especially youth) actually going to vote. And we're not just talking about the Presidential election. This is about Congress, and all the critical state and local races and ballot measures too. No matter what the polls say, voter turnout in the next few hours is the whole ball game.

VOTE in Your HOODIE. Send a Message for JUSTICE. Join the MOVEMENT.

Last week the UK Guardian published a bombshell piece on the origins of the fatefully dreadful decision to try to sell the climate bill without talking about the climate The story describes a March 2009 meeting at the Old Executive Office Building, the White House informed the leading environmental groups that it had decided climate change was not a winning message. The blunt headline: Revealed: the day Obama chose a strategy of silence on climate change

Challenges & Competitions Challenges and competitions enable the Federal government to tap into the expertise and creativity of the public in new ways. Challenges and competitions are high-risk, high-reward policy tools that can foster collaboration and participation in government activities through the process of co-creation.  As an inducement of participation, challenges and competitions may offer a variety of “prizes”, including cash, recognition, or the deployment of a winning solution.Why Challenges & Competitions?Challenges and competitions are important mechanisms for spurring innovation, solving tough problems, and helping agencies to advance their core missions.

On October 2, I led a climate protest inside the offices of the Boston Globe.OK, it was really a meeting in a small conference room with editorial page editor Peter Canellos and members of his staff. But it was, in essence, a protest.I used to be a card-carrying member of the mainstream media; just a few years ago, I was the editor of the Globe's Ideas section. Peter is a former colleague.With me was Craig Altemose, founder and executive director of Better Future Project, a Cambridge-based non-profit dedicated to climate action, on whose working board I serve as a volunteer. We were joined by two members of BFP's advisory board: MIT's Kerry Emanuel, one of the country's leading climate scientists (and, until recently, a Republican); and Boston College's Juliet Schor, a sociologist and economist who is a respected thinker on climate and the economy. Last year, Altemose was arrested protesting the Keystone XL pipeline at the White House along with another advisory board member, Bill McKibben of 350.org, and 1251 other concerned citizens.

Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein was the latest to get arrested after she brought supplies to activist treesitters attempting to block construction of the Keystone XL pipeline in Texas. Stein issued a statement criticizing both President Obama and Governor Romney for their policies on fossil fuels:

For example, rising sea levels in the Northeast, which are increasing three to four times faster than global rates, according to federal statistics, will bring more flooding and damaging storm surges that ride atop high seas. Warmer air can hold more water vapor, meaning storms could drop more precipitation. New England has seen more erratic precipitation in recent years with extreme rain and snowfall events increasing by 85 percent since 1948, according to a climate report issued last week by US Representative Ed Markey, called “The New New England.”

Hurricane Sandy: Is Climate Change to Blame?Some of the nation's most outspoken scientists on human-caused climate change were active on twitter explaining how global warming influenced hurricane Sandy. Well-known skeptics were tweeting as well, some denying the hurricane-climate link.

When it comes to climate change, some of the wealthiest people in the world have weighed the fate of the Earth and every living thing on it for untold generations to come, the seasons and the harvests, this whole exquisite planet we evolved on, and they have come down on the side of more profit for themselves, the least needy people the world has ever seen.

Bill McKibben on Hurricane Sandy and Climate Change: "If There Was Ever a Wake-up Call, This Is It"

Extreme Weather Hits the Poor First – and Hardest

I see climate silence as a failure of the mainstream media; a politico-media complex too enthralled by the story lines pitched to them by the campaigns to force either to address an infinitely pressing issue that falls outside its comfort zone. There were no efforts at all to examine the candidates' positions on climate policy in light of the record drought and heat temps, to press either for substantive answers. Climate silence is a product of failed leadership, to be sure, but also of our professional information gatherers and storytellers.