Environment

Join us on the Phone Forum with Riane Eisler: Visionary of Partnership Politics and Economics

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I spent way too long blogging about Jared Diamond this morning and don’t have time to say much about our guest on tomorrow night’s Phone Forum, Riane Eisler, except that she has been at the megahistory business much longer than Diamond, and she is equally at ease with the corporate elite as he is, but she tells them in no uncertain terms that Capitalism isn’t going to cut it. Left audiences like to hear her say that. But what she tells them is this: Socialism also won’t cut it. Both are subject to the same kind of economism that fails to see that “the real wealth of nations–and the world–consists of the contributions of people and nature.” Both neglect the non-monetary segments of the economy: the contributions of natural systems and of unpaid work, most of it by women.

Environment

Jared Diamond's "Will Big Business Save the Earth?"

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Q: What’s the difference between cheap, clean, plentiful energy from nuclear fusion and the final and utter collapse of capitalism? A: None. Both are always ten to twenty years in the future. If we know anything about the Left it’s that it has always seen the failures and brutalities of capitalism clearly, and has always failed to appreciate its adaptability and powers of survival. Now here comes Jared Diamond, the brilliant eco-historian (of Guns, Germs and Steel) whose last message to us was about how civilizations collapse, telling us in today’s NYTimes that big corporations may save us all.

Culture

Art for Earth’s Sake: Jackie Brookner’s Biosculptures

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“Fifteen years ago, I couldn’t convince people there was a water problem. Now things are different in a good way in that people are more aware that there is a problem, and in a bad way in that the problem is so much more dire.” — Jackie Brookner
Jackie Brookner is a revolutionary among revolutionaries. All environmental art is inherently revolutionary in that it challenges viewers directly to rethink the ways they interact with nature and to take ownership, for better or worse, of the ways they affect and alter the ecosystem. Brookner’s Biosculptures–living works of art whose porous surfaces are inhabited by carefully selected organisms whose job it is in nature to clean and filter the toxins out of aquatic ecosystems–raise the bar by presenting that challenge not only to viewers but to the environment itself.

Environment

Rush Connects Tobacco Liars and Climate Change Liars

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As I channel-surfed from Green 960 (Air America) to Hot Talk 560 in the car this morning, I stopped on 560 long enough to listen to Rush Limbaugh ranting about the climate change “hoax” he says we’ve all been duped by and the tobacco industry’s lies way back when claiming that there was no proof that smoking caused cancer. I found it strange that Rush was connecting the two together, and wondered if he realized that the folks that lied about smoking back in the day happen to be the same folks that have been lying about global warming. Back when my mother was smoking three packs a day, doctors and scientists started to connect the dots between smoking and cancer. Tobacco companies hired their own scientists to refute the evidence. Tobacco industry executives even testified before Congress that there was no proven connection between cancer and smoking.

Culture

Escapist Movies, Education, CA Bankruptcy, Copenhagen…

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To all American readers: I trust you had a fine Thanksgiving. Our son was home and we did the nuclear family thing and went to two fun movies that we all three enjoyed a bunch: “Pirate Radio,” about the radio station I used to listen to at high school in England, and “2012,” which you wouldn’t think would be fun as it involves the death of almost all life on earth, but it’s so fantastic and unrealistic while being brilliantly presented and curiously full of humanity (though unforgivably as much a male-run world as that of Pirate Radio without any historical excuse for it), that we just sat back and lived through the roller coaster ride. Back in reality, if I was blogging today, which I’m not, being about to go off with the family to do a token soup kitchen stint and then put the lad on his plane back to college in LA, I might have mentioned this beautifully written article about the poverty-stricken state of education in California, by a woman who teaches in a rich school and a poor school simultaneously, or this about the cost of pre-school ($12,000 to $20,000) in San Francisco or this about a school for dropouts that works, run by a convicted bank robber and a former methamphetamine user. The wider story to the recent student sit ins at Cal State schools protesting firings of low income workers and huge increases in student fees is that California, which once had the best financed education in the country now has almost the worst. It all goes back to a citizen revolt against property taxes, Prop 13, passed in 1978, and it’s taken this long for it to bankrupt the state and there are many more bills to pay arising from the high cost of inadequate educations for low income Californians.

Culture

Nothing Is Wasted: The Art of Aurora Robson

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“The forms in my work are derivative of nightmares I had when I was a child. My fodder is junk mail, litter, waste, and nightmares. My job is to transform these things into art.” — Aurora Robson
When something terrible happens, it might someday somehow be transformed into something less terrible — this is the personal belief to which I most stubbornly cling. This isn’t idealism.

Environment

Give Thanks? Are You Kidding? Um, No, I'm Not.

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For the canaries in the coal mine, the first whiff of gas is no time for thanksgiving. The second will likely kill them. But the miners who notice and get the hell out give thanks for the dead canaries. I have a liking for canaries because an eminent friend of my mother’s, the Maharani of Kutch, smuggled hers in on a visit to England but got caught when leaving, and had to give it at the airport to my mother, who gave it to me. It was the only pet I had as a child in our big religious communal house.

Environment

"Star Nonviolent Civil Disobedience"

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Derrick Jensen wants to destroy civilization. The well known author, environmental activist, philosopher and “anarcho-primitivist” argues we should speed up the impending collapse of the global industrial society because when “civilization” collapses the aftermath won’t be as bad as if we simply allowed it to collapse on its own. He asks, “Do you believe that this culture will undergo a voluntary transformation to a sane and sustainable way of living?” Most respond no. He then continues, “How would this understanding – that this culture will not voluntarily stop destroying the natural world, eliminating indigenous cultures, exploiting the poor, and killing those who resist – shift our strategy and tactics?

Environment

Getting the Right "Meme" to Copenhagen

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When the concept of “framing” an issue comes up, people more often than not think of George Lakoff as the “Go To” guy. If it were me, I’d go to Patrick Reinsborough, one of the founders of SmartMeme.org
I’d met Patrick at a social activists train the trainer workshop led by George Lakey (not Lakoff). The young people I met at that workshop, including Patrick, gave me a huge sense of hope for our world. Today, I got an email from SmartMeme.org with a video about their hopes to have an influence on the climate change gathering in Copenhagen. I know many of the people in this video. They’re brilliant and we need to help get them there!

Christianity

Launching my blog posts: A Sufi Look at Genesis, with a Tribute to King James

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When a couple gets married, they traditionally have a wedding. When a child is born, people usually throw some kind of celebration. When a ship sets out on its maiden voyage, it is customary to break a champagne bottle against its bow. A position as a blogger is, of course, nothing compared to those things. What are the opinions of one pundit, compared to a marriage, a new human life, or the ocean-crossing journeys of a ship?