Volunteers
It’s easy to feel a bit helpless with the Gulf oil spill. The first step is to stop by these Facebook pages:
Mobilize Support for Gulf Oil Beaches
Gulf Coast Oil Spill Volunteer Cleanup
If you can’t go to the Gulf and volunteer, consider a donation. We can’t vouge for this organzation, but saw it on the first listing’s Facebook page.
Donate: Emerald Coast Keeper
The U.S. citizens’ perspective of the world might not be quite as bad as depicted in this map, but I feel it may be close. While although “we are all one”, and Americans have the best of intentions, the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.
In a recent NPR interview, a few large truck and SUV drivers were asked if there were any connection to their driving habits and the Gulf oil spill, and, did they feel any remorse. They said “no”, they still needed “to get to work, and deliver the farm goods”. We’re all part of this problem, even the Amish, most of who don’t drive. They still need and send deliveries sent by truck. As Tolle asks, “Are you cleaning up the mess or contributing to the problem?
Back to the American perspective. This map illustrates the longstanding isolation and provincial perspective that seems unique to the USA. Just across the border in Quebec, the world view is, more worldly. The U.S. is a young country full of many, but not all, who still think we’re on top of the world. It’s understandable. Our continent stands alone, our controlled media* and corporatocracy has perpetuated a tunnel vision for many years that is catching up to us. This narrow vision that has been sold to us, effects not only our global view, but our environmental abuse, and our imperialistic tendencies.
At Mountain Spirit Institute, our mission is to broaden the American perspective. See our programs on Peru and the USA/Peruvian Music Exchange where a bit of Peru was brought into the schools and communities in the Northern U.S.
What do you think about this map? We invite your comments.
*“Cause when they own the information Oh, they can bend it all they want”. John Mayer
Thanks to Amanda Richards for sending this map my way. She was a little apprehensive about my posting this, but I thought, “Heck, our readers have a good sense of humor”.
Guevara's Granddaugther for PETA
In the last few years, interesting graffiti has been popping up through out South America. “Vegan Straightedge” and “Vegan Revolution” can be found on street corners if one searches. It’s a fascinating movement and even more intriguing that it is spreading through South America.
“Meatless Mondays” have caught on in the United States and may be making a jump down south. Che Guevara’s granddaughter (left) showed her support for the cause last year by posing for a PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, ad.
Image: The granddaughter of Cuban revolutionary leader Ernesto “Che” Guevara is at the forefront of another revolution — for vegetarianism. Read more..
Chevron's Logo?
Please sign this petition to Chevron’s CEO, Mr. Watson asking that Chevron finally do the right thing in Ecuador. (En español aquí)
Dear Mr. Watson:
As the new CEO of Chevron, climate change and the environmental and human rights impacts of Chevron’s operations are the two issues that will define your tenure at the helm of one of the world’s largest oil companies. Chevron has fallen behind other businesses and many political leaders already taking a leadership position on climate change. Furthermore, your company is drawing increasing criticism for failing to rectify its massive human rights and environmental disaster in Ecuador. Taking the following steps will demonstrate a true commitment to environmental responsibility and respect for human rights – which will only strengthen your company’s future.
We the undersigned call on Chevron CEO John Watson to:
* Clean up Chevron’s toxic legacy in Ecuador, compensate affected communities for health and environmental impacts, and provide affected people real access to health care and potable water.
* Develop a global environment and human rights policy that will prevent similar tragedies in the future.
* Adopt aggressive strategies to provide clean energy to a carbon-constrained world.
By John Perkins
Sent by email, also published in the Huffington Post
John Perkins
While countries around the world continue to watch their economies collapse, and Goldman-Sachs leaders testify to Congress about how they manipulated both their shareholders and the American public, we are also faced with a tragic oil spill on our most fragile coastlines.
The sad truth is that oil, greed and fake accounting work hand in hand to empower those who have — and significantly disempower those who do not.
In my book, Hoodwinked I talk about the 30,000 Ecuadorians who filed a lawsuit against Texaco (since purchased by Chevron). The company destroyed vast sections of rain forest and the toxic wastes from its operations allegedly killed many people and made many more chronically sick. (more…)
Book Describes How to Transition
Adapt or Die
“If your town is not yet a Transition Town, here is guidance for making it one. We have little time, and much to accomplish.”
Richard Heinberg, Post Carbon Institute, Santa Rosa, California, author of ‘Power Down’ and ‘Peak Everything’
We live in an oil-dependent world, and have got to this level of dependency in a very short space of time, using vast reserves of oil in the process – without planning for when the supply is not so plentiful. Most of us avoid thinking about what happens when oil runs out (or becomes prohibitively expensive), but The Transition Handbook shows how the inevitable and profound changes ahead can have a positive outcome. These changes can lead to the rebirth of local communities, which will grow more of their own food, generate their own power, and build their own houses using local materials. They can also encourage the development of local currencies, to keep money in the local area.
The book has three sections, Read more
Imagine A World Without Fish
Ocean acidification threatens over one million species with extinction–and with them, our entire way of life.
Time for Course Corrections
DVD: Directed by Barbara Ettinger
Recipient of the NOAA 2010 Environmental Hero Award
A Sea Change documents how the pH balance of the oceans has changed dramatically since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution: a 30% increase in acidification. With near unanimity, scientists now agree that the burning of fossil fuels is fundamentally reshaping ocean chemistry. Experts predict that over the next century, steady increases in carbon dioxide emissions and the continued rise in the acidity of the oceans will cause most of the world’s fisheries to experience a total bottom-up collapse–a state that could last for millions of years. Read more..
Directed by Barbara Ettinger
Produced by Barbara Ettinger, Sven Huseby, Susan Cohn Rockefeller
Music by Joel Goodman
Sign the Petition
Now is a Good Time to Break the Oil Addiction
From Greenpeace
On March 31st, President Obama announced a plan to allow oil and gas exploration and drilling in 167 million acres of coastal waters that have been protected for decades. Obama’s plan would expose the waters off southern Atlantic states and the eastern Gulf of Mexico to oil spills and other dangers, threatening many tourism and fishing-dependent communities. The news is even worse for Alaska’s Beaufort and Chukchi Seas, which are especially sensitive to oil drilling because they provide critical habitat for polar bears, whales, seals and other important Arctic species.
And of course, opening more areas to drilling only prolongs our dangerous addiction to oil, which is pushing us closer and closer to runaway climate change.
It’s time to quit oil, get clean, and make a permanent switch to renewable energy. Tell our President to just say no to offshore drilling.
Gulf Oil Spill 2010, Image: Reuters, UK
I can’t help but think, with the Gulf oil spill, that we’re simply fleas on the back of a living organism that’s about to shake us off. The spill is big. A retired expert mentioned this morning on The Power Hour internet radio show with Joyce Riley said there is not an easy way to stop such a huge oil spout, which is under such high pressure. It’s escaping the man-made hole created thousands of feet under the ocean’s surface. The expert actually said the only way he knew of containment, was to use an atomic blast, placed just in the right way, to seal the hole.
In any event, Chief Sealth from the Pacific Northwest was right, “We do not own the earth.” This latest mishap by us, seems to really be screwing things up. To be more informed on a culmination of “the perfect storm” read Richard Heinberg’s Peak Everything which addresses a number of issues which are peaking on our planet today.
Below if from Amazon’s page on Peak Everything.
Heinberg is Brilliant
From Publishers Weekly
In his latest, “Peak Oil” expert Heinberg (Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies) puts that theory in place alongside corresponding peaks in population, food production, climate stability and fresh water availability to paint a grim future of overlapping and accelerating global crises. For an introduction to Peak Oil, the idea that coming fossil fuel shortages will be sudden and drastic, readers should seek Heinberg’s earlier works; this volume assumes familiarity and addresses the challenges a post-carbon world poses for a global community “as reliant on hydrocarbons as it is on water, sunlight, and soil.” The worst-case scenario, “global economic meltdown” read more
Description of Peak Everything
The twentieth century saw unprecedented growth in population, energy consumption, and food production. As the population shifted from rural to urban, the impact of humans on the environment increased dramatically.
The twenty-first century ushered in an era of declines, in a number of crucial parameters:
* Global oil, natural gas, and coal extraction
* Yearly grain harvests (more…)
Another Tear-Down
Seminario, performing in Keene, NH
Guillermo Seminario, the director of Chimu Inka, the Peruvian band came to the U.S under invitation from Mountain Spirit Institute to run a program to perform and teach about Peruvian folklore music in 2008. In one Vermont town, we were being housed in a very nice old residence in one of the more ritzy parts of town. At one point during the evening, Guillermo turned to me, shaking his head, saying, “In Peru, there are children without food, and a place to sleep.” He queried, “It confusing me, seeing such wealth in your country when Peru is so poor in many parts of my country.”
Our Peruvian Guests on the Coast, NH
We have thought and discussed this much since that day. Tearing down a perfectly good house just doesn’t seem right.
It’s more than, “Finish your broccoli, there are people starving in other countries,” but it stems from the same disconnect. It’s true the U.S and other 1st world country’s inhabitants are happily oblivious to our role in contributing to The Empire’s excesses. It’s time to think small, and stop the waste. I have a gut feeling this level of living will not continue, mostly due to peak oil. It’s actually quite obvious.
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