A report from ecoAmerica outlines how public opinion trends around climate change in the U.S. have moved from being a niche issue to the mainstream.
Author: Oregon PeaceWorks
New Material May Make Solar Power “Dirt Cheapâ€
KEVIN BULLIS – A new type of solar cell, made from a material that is dramatically cheaper to obtain and use than silicon, could generate as much power as today’s commodity solar cells.
Opposition to Iraq War May Save Syria
DAVID SWANSON – Evidence of “weapons of mass destruction” is “no slam dunk,” U.S. officials are saying this time around, reversing the claim made about Iraq by then-CIA director George Tenet. Opposition to a U.S.-led attack on Syria is growing rapidly in Europe and the United States, drawing its strength from public awareness that the case made for attacking Iraq had holes in it.
Moral Obscenities in Syria: Who Benefits?
PHYLLIS BENNIS and DAVID WILDMAN – The threat of a reckless, dangerous, and illegal US or US-led assault on Syria is looking closer than ever. . . . The US government has been divided over the Syria crisis since it began. . . . But the situation is changing rapidly, and the Obama administration appears to be moving closer to direct military intervention. That would make the dire situation in Syria inestimably worse.
What Would It Take to Start a Peace Army?
STEPHANIE VAN HOOK – Nonviolent Army: to many, this would seem like an unnatural contradiction. Armies are by definition violent; nonviolence is too passive and weak to be of any use in societal defense. But . . . soldiers are only conditioned to use violence, . . . and nonviolence does not mean passivity; it means active, creative courage that goes beyond refraining from consciously harming others toward building a community where everyone belongs–where no one is “other.â€
Will Public Inaction Allow a War With Syria?
TOM H. HASTINGS – How culpable is the person who watches a mugger rob someone and does nothing? What is our social psychology as we bystand silently while our government gears up toward yet another war crime? Lies or misleading information that leads to war should be an enforceable war crime and crime against humanity.
Connecting Globally, Acting Locally for a More Peaceful and Just Future
PETER DECCY – For 68 years the peace movement has worked to insure nuclear weapons will never be used in war again. Worldwide solidarity of peace movements is increasingly possible and is more and more necessary in the work for peace so war will have no place to take root, so the wealth of nations is directed to creating a better world for its citizens and not spent on preparations for its destruction.
New NSA Revelation – Spying Goes Beyond Metadata
JAMES BALL and SPENCER ACKERMAN – The National Security Agency has a secret backdoor into its vast databases under a legal authority enabling it to search for US citizens’ email and phone calls without a warrant, according to a top-secret document passed to the Guardian by Edward Snowden.
Landmine Foe’s Book Reveals Winning Strategy
DAVID SWANSON – Jody Williams’ new book is called My Name Is Jody Williams: A Vermont Girl’s Winding Path to the Nobel Peace Prize, and it’s a remarkable story by a remarkable person. It’s also a very well-told autobiography, including in the early childhood chapters in which there are few hints of the activism to come. One could read this book and come away thinking “Anyone really could win the Nobel Peace Prize.”
If Peace Is Prized, a Nobel for Bradley Manning
NORMAN SOLOMON – Bradley Manning saw an opportunity to provide the crucial fuel of information for democracy and compassion, thereby illuminating terrible actions of the USA’s warfare state. He chose courage on behalf of humanity. He refused to just follow orders. The Nobel Committee must award him its Peace Prize to recognize his dedication to human rights and peace.
Nonviolent Blockaders Shut Down U.S./German Bomber Base
JOHN LAFORGE – On August 11, more than 750 people converged at Buchel Air Force Base — the largest joint U.S./German Luftwaffe air base — to condemn the retention of 20 U.S. nuclear weapons, in open violation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. In a show of popular rebellion 150 hearty war resisters blockaded all nine base entrances for 24 hours.
New Company Earns B Corps Certification
SARA SCHNEIDER – Notogroup, a Portland-based, national executive search firm, has been awarded B Corp certification after undergoing a comprehensive examination of its business practices, by the nonprofit B Lab. Companies that are designated B Corps meet high standards for social and environmental performance, accountability and transparency.
Why Alan Grayson is Now the Most Effective Member of the House
DAVID WEIGEL – Alan Grayson, the Democratic congressman from Orlando, is using a new strategy that is getting him closer to an unheralded title: The congressman who’s passed more amendments than any of his 434 peers. The strategy is simple. Grayson and his staff scan the bills that come out of the majority. They scan amendments that passed in previous Congresses but died at some point along the way. They resurrect or mold bills that can appeal to the libertarian streak in the GOP, and Grayson lobbies his colleagues personally.
Bradley Manning Wins Peace Prize
DAVID SWANSON – U.S. whistleblower and international hero Bradley Manning has just been awarded the 2013 Sean MacBride Peace Award by the International Peace Bureau, itself a former recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, for which Manning is a nominee this year.
Santa Monica Passes West Coast’s First Rights of Nature Ordinance
INTERVIEW BY SIMON DAVIS-COHEN – Santa Monica recently passed an ordinance that elevates its right to enforce its Sustainable City Plan, rights to clean air, water and soil, and the rights of nature above corporate entities’ privileges and powers. The interview is a written conversation between Read the Dirt editor Simon Davis-Cohen and Linda Sheehan, Executive Director of Earth Law Center and advocate of the Santa Monica Sustainability Rights Ordinance.
Why Florida Was Dubbed “the Worst Stateâ€
LAURA FINLEY – Much attention has been paid to Florida’s asinine Stand Your Ground law, which John Oliver on The Daily Show described as cut and pasted from 1880s Tombstone. That is just the start of it, however. Other backwards laws and policies have been passed, largely under uber-Conservative Governor Rick Scott.
Schrader Unveils Bipartisan Government Reform Package
KURT SCHRADER – No Labels and Congressional Problem Solvers are providing some of the only forums in Washington for Members on opposite sides of the aisle to sit down with one another and work through issues that ordinarily push us far apart. Among other efforts, the bipartisan group of Problem Solvers is unveiling a comprehensive legislative package to make government work more effectively.
Bradley Manning Cleared of ‘Aiding the Enemy’ But Guilty of Most Other Charges
ED PILKINGTON – While Bradley Manning, the source of the massive WikiLeaks trove of secret disclosures, was cleared of the charge of ‘Aiding the Enemy,’ he faces a possible maximum sentence of 136 years in military jail after he was convicted of most other charges on which he stood trial.
Together We Drew The Line
DAVID OSBORN – Saturday (July 27, 2013) we drew the line. Some 800 people came together from across the region including Vancouver (WA), the Tri-Cities, Astoria, Eugene, Bellingham, Vancouver (BC), Seattle, Portland and Hood River to demonstrate our unity in opposition to the oil, coal and gas terminals proposed throughout the Northwest and our commitment to take action such that none shall pass through our region.
An “Electoral Uprising” in Iran
KEVAN HARRIS – The contentious events of 2009 not only ensured four more years for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in the president’s office but were also heralded as signaling the death of reformist politics in Iran. Yet as another presidential election approached, the three-decade political improvisation called the Islamic Republic once again went off script.
U.S.-Afghan Strategic Partnership: Where Are the Voices of Afghan Citizens?
ERIN E. NIEMELA – While the U.S.-Afghan Strategic Partnership Agreement is supposed to ensure a secure and sovereign Afghanistan beyond the U.S. withdrawal in 2014, it does not take into account the opinions of those who will most likely be affected by its implementation – the Afghan people. Without their support, the partnership is more likely to inhibit the realization of a peaceful and secure Afghanistan.
TPP: The Terrible Plutocratic Plan
DAVID SWANSON – Like most of you I do not spend my life studying trade agreements, but the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is disturbing enough to make me devote a little time to it, and I hope you will do the same and get your neighbors to do the same and get them to get their friends to do the same — as soon as possible.
Obama’s Escalating War on Freedom of the Press
NORMAN SOLOMON – The part of the First Amendment that prohibits “abridging the freedom … of the press†is now up against the wall, as the Obama administration continues to assault the kind of journalism that can expose government secrets.
Three Oregon Counties See Petitions To Ban Genetically Modified Crops
CASSANDRA PROFITA – Activists are trying to ban genetically modified crops in Lane County through an initiative on the May 2014 ballot. Eugene-based Support Local Food Rights filed an initial petition on Wednesday, The Register-Guard reports. Lane is now the third county in Oregon to receive a petition to put the issue to a vote.
Trayvon Martin: A Jewish Response
RABBI MICHAEL LERNER – This article by a leading Rabbi connects the travesty of acquitting killer George Zimmerman with climate change and other environmental disasters through Jewish theology, and challenges us all to take personal responsibility for healing, repairing and transforming the world.
Snowden Seen as Whistle-Blower by Majority in New Poll
JONATHAN D. SALANT – A majority of U.S. registered voters consider Edward Snowden a whistle-blower, not a traitor, and a plurality says government anti-terrorism efforts have gone too far in restricting civil liberties, a poll released recently shows.
Statistics Show Nonviolence Works – Here’s How
INTERVIEW BY TERRY MESSMAN – Erica Chenoweth and her co-author, Maria Stephan, reveal in their book, Why Civil Resistance Works, that during the period of 1900 to 2006, nonviolent resistance campaigns are about twice as effective as violent ones in achieving their immediate goals of either regime change or territorial change. They also found that these trends hold even under conditions where most people expect nonviolent resistance to be ineffective.
Nonviolent campaigns were effective, for instance, against dictatorships; against highly repressive regimes that are using violent and brutal repression against the movements; and also in places where people would expect a nonviolent campaign to be impossible to even emerge in the first place — such as very closed societies with no civil society organization to speak of prior to the onset of the campaign.
Chenoweth conducted her research because of the skepticism that a lot of people have about the efficacy of nonviolence in these circumstances. In most of the violent insurgencies we look at, people will say the reason they are violent is because nonviolent resistance can’t work in these conditions. This is why it’s particularly striking that even in these types of conflicts, we’re seeing nonviolence resistance outperform so dramatically.
‘The real threat to our future is peak water’
LESTER BROWN – Peak oil has generated headlines in recent years, but the real threat to our future is peak water. There are substitutes for oil, but not for water. We can produce food without oil, but not without water.
Local Lawmaking: A Call for a Community Rights Movement
THOMAS LINZEY – Many have now concluded that our legislatures, environmental agencies and courts have all been privatized – and are now used by a corporate minority as just one more means to get oil and gas out of the ground, to run family farmers out of business, and to take everything of value that our communities have.
Advanced Battery Technology Opens New Vistas for Electric Vehicles
MARC CARTER, BRIT LIGGETT, TAZ LOOMANS – Four articles at Inhabitat.com tout recent advances in battery technology that open new horizons for electric vehicles. Inhabitat.com is a weblog devoted to the future of design, tracking the innovations in technology, practices and materials that are pushing architecture and home design towards a smarter and more sustainable future. The blog also addresses innovative design and practices in technology, energy, transportation, fashion and art.
Welch Leads Bipartisan Coalition in Congress to Block U.S. Intervention in Syria
OFFICE OF PETER WELCH – Washington, DC (June 27th) – Rep. Peter Welch joined with Rep. Chris Gibson (R-NY), Rep. Rick Nolan (D-MN), Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), and Rep. Walter Jones (R-NC) at a press conference today to unveil bipartisan legislation to block U.S. military intervention in Syria without an affirmative vote of Congress.
The Biggest Oversight in Obama’s Climate Plan is a Doozy
DAVID ROBERTS – While President Obama’s climate plan addresses U.S. coal-fired plants through EPA regulations, it neglects another, equally large aspect of the coal problem. Specifically, coal mining, leasing, transport, and export in the U.S. Northwest. There’s a bad situation there and it’s getting worse. Obama can and must address the situation head on and end coal leases on Montana and Wyoming public lands.
Climate Change Poses Grave Security Threat
DAMIAN CARRINGTON – Climate change poses as grave a threat to the UK’s security and economic resilience as terrorism and cyber-attacks, according to a senior military commander who was appointed as William Hague’s climate envoy this year. In his first interview since taking up the post, Rear Admiral Neil Morisetti said climate change was “one of the greatest risks we face in the 21st century,” particularly because it presented a global threat.
Reward of a Whistleblower: Solidarity or Solitary?
NORMAN SOLOMON – Rarely has any American provoked such fury in Washington’s high places. So far, Edward Snowden has outsmarted the smartest guys in the echo chamber — and he has proceeded with the kind of moral clarity that U.S. officials seem to find unfathomable. Bipartisan condemnations of Snowden are escalating from Capitol Hill and the Obama administration. More of the NSA’s massive surveillance program is now visible in the light of day — which is exactly what it can’t stand.
Mayors Call for Nuclear Abolition
DAVID SWANSON – Congress can’t break 10 percent approval. Obama’s arms shipments to Syria just crack 10 percent, with 11 percent approval. Over 80 percent of Americans in more polls than I can count say over and over again that the government is broken and does not represent us. But when the mayors of the cities of the United States get together nationally one begins to see positions taken, at least rhetorically, that resemble government of, by, or for the people.
U.S. Backs Violence and Torture in Bahrain
MATAR EBRAHIM MATTAR and JEFF BACHMAN – The U.S government is arming the authoritarian regime of the Bahraini royal family that uses wide-spread violence and torture to suppress its own people and crush a popular pro-democracy movement. Nearly two-and-a-half years after a peaceful uprising began in Bahrain, mass human rights abuses and torture are reaching new levels. They are used as a tool to extract forced confessions from journalists, democracy leaders, and medical doctors on trumped up terrorism charges.
Obama Launches ‘Coordinated Assault’ Against Warming
JEAN CHEMNICK – In a speech on Tuesday, June 25, at Georgetown University, President Obama said that rather than waiting for Congress to act on climate change, his administration would move forward in every way it could — curbing emissions, shoring up American infrastructure and heading “a coordinated assault” abroad on global warming.
Let Us Understand Our Government: Obama Backs First-Strike Nuclear War as U.S. Policy
FRANCIS A. BOYLE – “Nuclear deterrence†is not now and has never been the Obama administration’s nuclear weapons policy from the get-go, then by default this means that offensive first-strike strategic nuclear war fighting is now and has always been the Obama administration’s nuclear weapons policy. This policy will also be pursued and augmented by means of “integrated non-nuclear strike options.â€
Military Quietly Grants Itself the Power to Police the Streets Without Local or State Consent
JED MOREY – By making a few subtle changes to a regulation in the U.S. Code titled “Defense Support of Civilian Law Enforcement Agencies†the military has quietly granted itself the ability to police the streets without obtaining prior local or state consent, upending a precedent that has been in place for more than two centuries.
The War on Terror Has Not Made Us Safer
PHYLLIS BENNIS – The authorization for the use of military force should never have been passed.
Dramatic Rise in the Number of Homicides Drives Reduction in World Peace
INSTITUTE FOR ECONOMICS AND PEACE – A dramatic rise in the number of homicides and more countries, 59, increasing their military expenditure as a percentage of GDP were the key drivers in making the world a less peaceful place, according to the 2013 Global Peace Index (GPI) released today.
What if They Gave a War and Nobody Paid?
DAVID HARTSOUGH – As April 15 approaches, make no mistake: The tax money that many of us will be sending to the U.S. government pays for drones that are killing innocent civilians, for “better†nuclear weapons that could put an end of human life on our planet, for building and operating more than 760 military bases in over 130 countries all over the world. We are asked by our government to give moral and financial support to cutting federal spending for our children’s schools, Head Start programs, job training, environmental protection and cleanup, programs for the elderly, and medical care for all so that this same government can spend 50 percent of all our tax dollars on wars and other military expenditures.
How Germany Is Getting to 100 Percent Renewable Energy
THOMAS HEDGES – There is no debate on climate change in Germany. The temperature for the past 10 months has been three degrees above average and we’re again on course for the warmest year on record. There’s no dispute among Germans as to whether this change is man-made, or that we contribute to it and need to stop accelerating the process.
Nuclear Boss Seeks Corporate Welfare While Demanding Cuts in Renewable Subsidies
ANDY ROWELL, RICHARD COOKSON – The boss of a company set to build two nuclear reactors in Somerset has been demanding cuts to renewable energy subsidies and to help for people in fuel poverty while quietly lobbying the European Commission for financial help for new nuclear power stations.
War Not Over for Iraqi Survivors
KATHY KELLY – Ten years ago, in March of 2003, Iraqis braced themselves for the anticipated “Shock and Awe†attacks that the U.S. was planning to launch against them. The media buildup for the attack assured Iraqis that barbarous assaults were looming. I was living in Baghdad at the time, along with other Voices in the Wilderness activists determined to remain in Iraq, come what may. We didn’t want U.S. – led military and economic war to sever bonds that had grown between ourselves and Iraqis who had befriended us over the previous seven years. Since 1996, we had traveled to Iraq numerous times, carrying medicines for children and families there, in open violation of the economic sanctions which directly targeted the most vulnerable people in Iraqi society— the poor, the elderly, and the children.
White Ribbon Day: Inviting Men to Come Off the Sidelines
ROB OKUN – What about men who are trying to do the right thing? That was the thought I had the other day after hearing what was intended as an innocuous joke. “If you took a vote on which is the better gender,†a female friend said, “men would come in second.â€
Latest Hanford Leaks Dwarfed by History of Huge Leaks
JOHN LAFORGE – Federal and state officials said in February six giant underground tanks holding an explosive and toxic brew of highly radioactive liquid wastes are leaking at the 570-square-mile Hanford Reservation, on the Columbia River in South Central Washington State.
Nuclear Brahmins Again Call for Nuclear Disarmament
WINSLOW MYERS – Schultz, Kissinger, Perry and Nunn, those quintessentially establishment figures, have just posted in the quintessentially establishment Wall Street Journal their fifth editorial since 2007 advocating urgent changes enabling the eventual abolition of nuclear weapons on planet Earth.
Defense Giant Tries to Feed at the Public Trough
LAWRENCE S. WITTNER – At this time of severe cutbacks in government funding for food stamps, early childhood education, and Meals on Wheels, some Maryland legislators are hard at work looking out for the welfare of one of the world’s wealthiest corporations. Under a bill rapidly advancing in the legislature of that state, the Lockheed Martin Corporation will have the taxes on its luxurious Montgomery County hotel and conference center reduced by approximately $450,000 a year and will also receive a $1.4 million refund for the period since 2010.
Stop the Monsanto Protection Act
TWILIGHT GREENAWAY – It’s that exciting time of the year again when the Senate and House Appropriations Committees gets together to hash out the annual agriculture budget. I know, right? Really fun stuff.
This year, in addition to the usual underfunding of legislation that could make the food system more sustainable, the appropriations process has become especially charged, thanks to a one-paragraph addition called the “farmer assurance provision.â€