Some Call It Freedom, Afraid to be Free

Burn Baby, Burn!!

Haitians burned Monsanto’s trojan seeds. They know the value of freedom. The US government just allowed Monsanto’s alfalfa and other GMO crops to be planted from sea to shining sea. American politicians know the price of elections and are all too willing to sell out the future for the illusion of power today.

Not only could Genetically Engineered (frankenfoods) contaminate non-GMO (organic) fields, there’s no long term studies on the potential health effects of eating these bio-engineered foods. There’s also proof of Monsanto withholding key studies from its own scientists showing that GMO’s pose potential health hazards.

Our so-called representatives aren’t representing us at all. Politicians are a class in and of themselves focused on gaining wealth, privilege and access to power. So many of us are too busy trying to make the ends of an ever shortening rope meet, while juggling family and friends, who has time to be active. The real question is, who doesn’t have the time?

Games People Play

In Davos, Switzerland the rulers of this world recently met to forecast changes in world economies, social structures and more. The purpose of their meeting and the scenarios staged in strategy “games”? How to stay on top as the world spirals down.

Playing Chicken with a Billion

Cholera==No Surprise

Haiti is now facing a cholera outbreak, this should come as no surprise when over 1 million people are living in makeshift shelters, little more than tarps, tape and sticks. With poor sanitation and access to clean water limited the factors that can lead to an illness like cholera are set.

Of course our US politicians are too busy campaigning to release the $1.15 billion promised to Haiti. Surely some of that $$ could build some housing or water purification facilities. Why let people die? Maybe because Haiti’s oil reserves are reported to be greater than Venezuela’s? Maybe because Haiti has mineral wealth including, gold, uranium and iridium? Maybe because the takeover of Haiti’s resources would be so much easier without those fiery Haitians in the way. Worse things have happened.

Idealists Need Not Apply

The realists have won the day and they believe only in Pentagon budgets, data driven education and the pragmatism of multi-billion dollar bank payouts. Enter Bill McKibben originator of 350.org and his merry band of college students. All they wanted to do was return the solar panel that Ronald Reagan had removed from the White House. In a time when climate change has flooded Pakistan, fried Russians and given us temperature extremes unheard of sense such data has been recorded, you’d think accepting a solar panel wouldn’t be a big deal. After all, Mrs. Obama’s installation of an organic garden at the White House resulted in a marked increase in seed sales. Imagine what installing a panel on the roof could do! But, Mr. McKibben and friends were rejected as were the 40,000 people who signed on to the letter in support of the effort.

See, former President Jimmy Carter had installed solar panels in the 70′s. He recognized the importance of energy independence especially when the gas crisis hit. The current White House resident is more of a Reagan Democrat than an adherent to Carter’s populous ideas. Mr. Obama and his advisers deify the corporate model, Wall Street insiders are their mentors, heroes and former employers. The only oil crisis they recognize is how to cover up the long term effects of the BP spill and how to keep the Pentagon’s tanks topped off. Accepting a solar panel from a bunch of granola eating environmental activists is anathema to a government that has allied itself with endless war and outmoded energy.

Somewhere in a parallel universe it seemed that Americans loved dreamers, folks with vision and the courage to attempt the impossible to arrive at the improbable. In the current reality idealists are seen as idiots, the smart people don’t really believe in God (they just act like it so the dumb ones will continue to follow), and everyone knows that destruction is way more profitable than sustainability. When you destroy there’s always rebuilding to be done, when you sustain there’s no capital gains. So, Mr. McKibben and friends, thanks but no thanks . . .the administration will de-liberate and you can help reduce CO2 to 350 ppm by just holding your breath and waiting for change.

Who to Trust?

Who to trust in a system built on greed and lust

there’s so much profit in lying to us

from captains of sinking corporate ships

to politicians saying “read my lips”

there’s not a shred of truth in their alleged proofs

1 out of 5 People Do Not Have Access to Clean Drinking Water

Attorneys representing the health advocacy group Center for Science in the Public Interest and consumers from three states have accused Coca-Cola of using deceptive labeling on its Vitaminwater line of drinks, including claims that they reduce risks of disease.

Coca-Cola which owns Vitamin Water is also the largest beverage company in the world using 283 billion liters (74 billion gallons) of water in 2004. In a world where 1 out of 5 people do not have access to clean water, Coca Cola has a water use ratio of 2.7 to 1. This means that for nearly 3 liters of water only 1 liter goes into the product, the rest is wasted in cleaning and other processes. This is unconscionable! Yet to question the corporation is almost sacrosanct. How dare you question the God of free enterprise? Well maybe we should raise more questions especially when the enterprise thrives on lies.

Coca Cola attempted to have the Center for Science in the Public Interest law suit thrown out by claiming, “no consumer could reasonably be misled into thinking vitaminwater was a healthy beverage.” Uhh, the product is called VITAMIN water. In an america obsessed with easy paths to health and nutrition, a product carrying the vitamin name and boasting health claims is guaranteed a prime place in the consumers mind.

Now that it’s clear that Coca Cola has lied will the company change. Probably not and even if they do the damage is already done. Another sugary drink has been passed off as healthy as consumers are continued to be told that colorful syrups are a better choice than good old fashioned H2O.

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-robbins/the-dark-side-of-vitaminw_b_669716.html

Redundant Redolence of Societal Decay

Another spill how much oil must cover the ground until we realize the time is now? Green technology exists but the corporations are unwilling to stop the drilling cause they’re making a killing. Organizations and people on the sidelines with too few resources, too little time, not enough lawyers, lawsuits and court rooms to mete justice to the machine which continually consumes. Fined a billion here a billion there, what do billions mean to trillionaires?

Species die off from fossil fuel run-off, barely warrants a batted eye or an errant cough, let them eat sludge says the CEO ensuring top stock holders have dividends from which to fund exotic drugs . . .let the planet die, to Mars we’ll fly . . .but before the spacecraft can burst free of the gate the earthquakes swallowing the scheme, it only takes an electro-magnetic pulse from the sun to set us all back to square one . . .you’d think such awareness would be numbing yet our hubris is so numbing, drunk on excess we can not see what planetary pariahs we’re becoming

Video of Oil Spill in China

Rally to Stop Keystone XL Pipeline

Rally at Canadian Embassy, Wash. DC

As the US east coast bakes in triple digit temperatures Friends of the Earth, Corporate Ethics International, Friends of the Earth, Indigenous Environmental Network, National Wildlife Federation, Natural Resources Defense Council and Sierra Club joined together to protest the Keystone XL pipeline. Yes another sexy name applied to a project which has the potential of furthering the devastation of land, wildlife and other natural resources such as clean water.

The Keystone XL is proposed to take oil from the Alberta, Canada tar sands down through the central US to the Gulf of Mexico, a distance of over 1,900 miles. States to be crossed by the pipeline include Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas. Of course the multi-billion dollar oil industry is trying to save a few bucks by getting Congress to allow the use of pipe which contains less steel in certain areas. Seems like we heard this same tune when it came to BP’s blow-out prevention technology in the Gulf. Our addiction to oil, as admitted by GW Bush, is obviously clouding the minds of politicians.

This is why we the people must cry loud and spare not. If our elected representatives continue to forget who they are paid to represent we must speak up for ourselves, organize and change the direction this nation is headed in. Events like today’s rally are keys towards realizing a sustainable future guided by engaged citizens.

Last Drop of Oil, Last Gasp of Air

Nonstop the gushing
healing so necessary
why waste time on the blame game
One finger at you three back at me,
lets turn these fingers into a helping hand and set the captives free
Mr BP CEO you messed up so how can we come together in full responsibility
cause you’re only sucking the planets blood to feed my insatiability

Last drop of oil, Last gasp of air
not even enough for a prayer
searching for Nemo in BP’s oily inferno
as above so below
there must be a (chakra) leak internal
energy flows with no end in sight
buttons pushed lead to bad nights
youth on the street express love as a fight
we stuff emotions to work in a box
we profess free while holding tight to all we’ve got
as above so below there’s no separation
the Gulf gusher simply models our multinational/internal/external/ desperation

How many species must die so my car can go?
how many wetlands turned to oily wastelands for the sake of convenient transportation?
In a nation built on slavery and genocide who feels a pinch when filling up the ride?
So separate from cause and effect we wonder if we need to slow down after the wreck
Business as usual, profits at all costs
discounting 7 generations or more, smiling on the way to the mega-store
constantly extracting with no way to give back
no intent to return what’s been taken from the ground and burned
no reciprocity to the support of our humanity
lost in the insanity of unlimited growth fueled by vanity
What are we without fresh water, fertile earth & clean air?
If we can’t sustain life here it’s hubris to think we’ll do better elsewhere

there’s no security in oil more disasters than we care to admit
the corporation is the gun, greed the bullet
we the people squeeze the trigger making decisions oblivious of consequences
the dead children of Operation Iraqi Liberation (oil)
afghani-pipeline-istan, Nigerian fields awash with crude hued blood
strange fruits from Alberta tar sands, oil mixed with mud
We have found the enemy and he is me
i must embrace the other, make the criminal my brother
unconditional love like the fully engaged mother
then we transform pain into joy
blame into opportunity
our oily reality into a sun-drenched, wind blown future of sustainability

How Long is Too Long, How Much Too Much?

The BP well flows into the Gulf nearing month 3, how many have stopped to ponder how we can live without pumping oil constantly? Utah’s Great Salt Lake almost becomes another oil-bath, causes unknown, results devastating to the innocent. Nature pays for our addiction and we continue on as though there’s no other way but business as usual.

Bill McKibben laid it out plainly in his newest book Eaarth, ” . . .we’ll need to change to cope with the new Eaarth we’ve created. We’ll need . . .to get smaller and less centralized, to focus on growth but on maintenance, on a controlled decline from the perilous heights we’ve climbed.” pg 204

Oil companies quickly assume full responsibility and say whatever the cost they’ll pay, mostly because the obscene profits they’ve accrued make paying easy as —-pumping more crude. The President postures like a tough guy on tv, while being fully aware of the political expediency of pay to play politics determining energy policy. His hands are tied until we the people apply pressure. The pressure may come in the form of turning off the AC and using fans, switching from the dryer to clothes lines, biking a few days a week to work rather than driving or car pooling. Such small steps when expanded to the community level mean a lot.

As we seize our own power to live on less, the influence wielded by the mega-corporations diminishes and our representatives can get back to the job of representing we the people. A wise man once told me, “Inch by inch anything’s a cinch, by the yard it’s hard.” Let’s make the switch to living in harmony with earth one step at a time.

Oil & Life Don’t Mix

Cry me a river, too bad tears can’t replenish the waters laid waste by our ravenous taste for oil based living. Newsflash!!! The water we have on Earth is the water we will have and as BP’s well continues to pump oil at numbers ranging from 200,000 to 2,000,000 gallons a day, depending on who you trust, the waters we as humans get to use are decreasing. As humans are apt to do, we will find a way to reason our way out of collective responsibility, yet the thousands of species affected by the petrol/chemical soup created by BP and it’s efforts to “clean-up” will suffer cataclysmic consequences.