It’s Getting Hot In Here

“Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you.”

-Joseph Heller, Catch 22

Ever wonder where your tax dollars go? I mean besides wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, bailouts for Wall Street and tax cuts for the richest of the rich.

How about our government’s rapidly expanding domestic surveillance apparatus? And I’m not talking about Bush-Cheney using AT&T to monitor our phone conversations or issues around privacy settings on Facebook. While those are important issues as well, a new story developing in the national media is about how the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) uses financial and human resources to persecute anti-corporate animal right and environmental activists.

It’s been recently revealed in the New York Times that my friend and comrade scott crow was the subject of FBI surveillance for the better part of a decade. scott organized direct actions around animal rights, environmental, anti-war and anti-capitalist campaigns with a dozen arrests and never charged with anything more severe than trespassing. scott also was a co-founder of an anarchist grassroots relief effort called Common Ground in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.

Through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) documents, we’ve found out that the FBI dug through scott’s trash, posted a camera on a light post outside his Austin, TX home, kept detailed records on who came and went from his house, tried to get the Internal Revenue Service to come after him and his partner for tax evasion and wanted to bring a grand jury against him. Most alarming, they turned five fellow activists into FBI informants.

Some of scott’s story is my story. I worked with him on many of the anti-corporate actions and campaigns detailed in the FOIA documents. At least two of the five informants were “friends” or “acquaintances” of mine. I also most likely had legal difficulty while traveling in Australia in 2005, which led to my detention, forcible removal and banishment, because of the FBI’s investigation into our work in Texas. Continue reading ‘The FBI’s Not-So-Secret War against Green Activists’

Shreya Indukuri and Daniela Lapidous, ACE Youth Advisory Board members and juniors at the Harker School in San Jose, CA, paid a visit to the White House yesterday, but they didn’t just go for a tour. Through working with ACE, this energy-smart duo is scaling up their efforts to spur efficient energy use in America’s high schools – and sharing their ideas with America’s leaders.

Yesterday, in front of an invite-only audience of CEOs, White House advisors, and utility industry leaders, Shreya and Daniela shared the story of how they reduced their school’s energy use by 13 percent and founded their own non-profit, SmartPowerEd.

They shared a stage with U.S. Secretary of Energy, Steven Chu; Secretary of Agriculture, Tom Vilsack; Director of the Office of Science and Technology, John Holdren; and Chairperson of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, Nancy Sutley.

In their talk, they let our leaders know that young people care about the future and energy use, and that they are ready to get involved with solutions. They closed with two questions for Secretary Chu and others: how are you going to harness the potential of young people? How are you going to prioritize energy education and inspire young people to act?

You can see a video of their talk with White House officials here. More to come from ACE’s Emily Adler, who accompanied Shreya and Daniela to the event. What a day!

What I learned from spending 5 minutes looking at a Tea Party twitter feed.
cross-posted from Beyond the Choir

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the activist filter bubble, the reverberating echo-chamber of insular social media and political networks that keeps progressives marginal and talking to ourselves. Recently, I’ve had several different Tea Party twitter accounts follow me (at least four this week alone) and began talking to friends about whether or not this means they are 1) building lists of progressive activists for potential future smear-campaigns; 2) following their opposition so they can Retweet things out of context to scare/outrage their base; or 3) genuinely interested in hearing perspectives outside their own echo-chamber. Whatever their purposes, it reminded me that we can learn a lot from the way our opposition presents itself through social media forums (of course there is a lot of deception and other missteps that we don’t want to emulate, but there are some transferrable best practices mixed in too – here’s some of both).

A few minutes ago I got an email notice that @TheTeaParty_net is following me.

1) Their twitter profile (which I see in the notification email) succinctly states the values they profess to hold: “Limited federal government • Individual freedoms • Personal responsibility • Free markets • Returning political power to the states and the people”

I already know what they stand for and I haven’t even looked at their twitter feed yet. In fact, their statement of values is likely the thing that will make me choose to look or not look. And here’s what I notice from literally 5 minutes of browsing their twitter feed: 2) Constant creation of an “us vs. them” narrative, inviting people to identify as part of their group (“us”) and asking people to take a small action (retweeting) to signal their insiderness. A kinestetic action simple as pressing a button helps solidify the choice that was made by the tweeter. It asks them to take a stand, pick a side, and then reinforces that choice with a physical action that their peers can see. They ask their tweeps to do this on a regular basis. Continue reading ‘Lessons from Tea Party Tweets’

It’s called the Self Express: and the catchy name isn’t the only unusual thing about the 38-foot bus which a group of Northwest students and recent graduates are converting into a living space that will transport them across the country this summer.  By the time it’s finished, the former 1989 school bus will be ready to run entirely on used vegetable oil, and will be outfitted with a solar panel installation on the roof.  For the bulk of the summer it will serve as a temporary home for six youth activists determined to show that sustainable living in the twenty-first century is both possible and practical.

The Self Express project is a grassroots effort launched by youth organizers based at Linfield College in McMinnville, Oregon who have a vision for a better future.  Traveling across the US in an essentially carbon-neutral vehicle, they plan to create a real-life example of community-oriented living.  The group intends to connect with local nonprofits and charities in locations they visit across the United States, performing service and volunteer work that gives back to the community.  They will also travel to and participate in key events in the US climate movement happening over the next few months. 

“I’m really interested to see what’s going on in our country,” says Katie Kann, a recent graduate of Linfield College who will be setting out on the Self Express later this month.  “I’m tired of only hearing about the negative stuff in the news, stuff that makes me sad. I want to see the good things that fellow citizens are doing to help people and improve quality of life across our country.”

In this way the Self Express project connects the hands-on solutions work needed to jumpstart a transition to a clean economy with the political organizing and activism that’s essential to building the sustained movement that will get us off fossil fuels for good.  Considering the scale of the challenge we’re facing, it’s neither logical nor useful to argue about whether climate activists should be addressing problems or building solutions.  We urgently need to do both these, things, which is why youth organizers aboard the Self Express will be connecting with community solutions projects while also facilitating communication between grassroots groups fighting fossil fuel infrastructure. Continue reading ‘Youth Activists Prepare for Community-Building Journey’

Yesterday marked the end of the weekend-long Ride to Conquer Cancer sponsored by…Enbridge?

While it is admirable that 5000 cyclists rode 200km and raised funds for cancer research, I wonder why Enbridge themselves have failed to do their part to stop cancer at its source. Enbridge’s attempt to pose as a socially-conscious engineering firm is hiding the fact that it is expanding the reach of tar sands oil, closely linked to causing cancer.

Enbridge has been finessing its plans to construct the Northern Gateway Pipeline, a pipeline originally proposed about 10 years ago and which is being pushed by the Harper agenda. The twin pipelines, which run from Northern Alberta to BC’s coast, will cross through 60 First Nations communities and over 1,000 streams and rivers. This means that in the event of a pipeline failure it is likely that waterways will be contaminated and the health impacts on local people are soon to follow.

Now let’s take Enbridge’s track record. The company has an average 60 leaks and spills per year between 1999-2008 and the Northern Gateway could add about 5 spills per year. With these statistics, it is not a matter of if there is a spill, but when there is a spill and where will it be. No oil or engineering company has ever been able to fully clean up their mess and recover 100% of oil leaked. One teaspoon of benzene, but one of the many contaminants released, can contaminate 260,660 gallons of water. In the event of a leak, carcinogenic toxins are released both into waterways, land, and the air.

In communities living downstream from tar sands projects, rare cancers are unfortunately not so rare. Bile duct cancer typically affects 1 in every 100,000 people. In Fort Chipeweyan, a community with a population of about 1200 people, there were five diagnosed cases in the span of about 5 years.  Bile duct cancer is among the many other cancers—colon cancer, leukemia, lymphoma to name a few—and diseases on the rise in Fort Chip, a community which draws its water from the Athabasca watershed. The watershed has been increasingly contaminated by tar sands projects.

Rising cancer rates seen in communities living downstream from the tar sands is bound to be replicated in communities living along Enbridge’s proposed pipeline. The associated health costs of the pipeline is only one of the many reasons that several communities have banded together to reject the proposal.

In a previous post written by Dustin Johnson, a Tsimshian from Prince Rupert and Terrace, BC and currently the Energy Campaigner for Sierra Club Prairie he reports:

On May 11th, 2011, on the traditional territories of the Blackfoot Confederacy in Calgary, Alberta, a historic solidarity statement of opposition to the Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline proposal was signed by leaders of the Blood Tribe, Alexander First Nation, Lubicon Lake Nation, Roseau River Anishinabe First Nation, Sai’kuz First Nation, Nadleh Whuten, Takla Lake First Nation and the Nakazdli First Nation.

Along with contributing to the increased risk of cancer, Enbridge’s pipeline is passing through unceded Indigenous land and has not respected Indigenous peoples’ right to free, prior, and informed consent as outlined in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

As Enbridge continues to fund cancer research, it can also do its part by stopping its own activities that contribute to cancer. Enbridge and Enbridge subsidiaries have been expanding their pipeline projects and threat to the health of communities across North America.  Merely helping fund cancer research does not absolve Enbridge of its responsibility to respect people living near these pipelines.

Tomorrow, thousands will gather at Blair Mountain to protect this historic site and end mountaintop removal.  They are marching toward a mountain that is slated to be destroyed because Big Coal used dead people’s names on their petition to re-open if for mining.  I’m not kidding.

Monday’s Washington Post story on the march revealed that Arch Coal and Alpha Natural Resources, the two companies seeking to mine the coal-rich Blair Mountain, are the ones intimidating the National Park Service into keeping it off the National Register. To remove Blair Mountain from the historic list, the coal companies submitted names of residents who opposed the listing: ie, people who no longer lived there, couldn’t be located by the West Virginia Attorney General’s office, and yes, dead people.

When confronted about the fraud, Obama’s National Park Service did nothing.  Despite his promise to raise the bar for government ethics and accountability, Obama has so far watched as the agencies under him answer to Big Coal. As Obama continues to let corrupt, dirty industries rule, young voters are growing skeptical of his promise to bring change to Washington.

The marchers are also facing the treachery the coal industry, when their private campground reservations were cancelled thanks to Big Coal’s stranglehold on the region.  The coal companies are using fraud and intimidation because they are scared that this movement of people might convince Obama to come out firmly on the side of ethics and American heritage.

In his piece covering the March on Blair Mountain, Bobby Kennedy Jr. writes that the men and women protecting this historic site stand strong against the “ascendancy of unsheathed corporate power that threatens now to overwhelm American Democracy.” Will Obama stand with the people and stand up to these corrupt industries?

President Obama has the opportunity to begin meeting his promise to stamp out government corruption, by restoring Blair Mountain’s place on the National Register.

Cross-posted from the new Thinkprogress Green.

VIDEO: ‘A LINK BETWEEN CLIMATE CHANGE AND JOPLIN TORNADOES? NEVER.’ | Watch and share this powerful visualization of Bill McKibben’s scathing Washington Post op-ed on our dangerously polluted world, narrated by Stephen Thomson:

This post was written by Michael Davidson.

One year from this week, government leaders, civil society members and representatives of the business community will meet in Rio de Janeiro to discuss the future of the planet. The Earth Summit (also called Rio+20 after the first such global event in 1992) can help lead to a more prosperous world that utilizes natural resources more efficiently and responds to the needs of the most impacted communities of environmental degradation. But only if youth help write the story, and here’s why.

Rio 1992 was a watershed moment for the global environmental conscience. Treaties were signed, commissions created, and action plans drafted. Yet one of the most memorable speeches from the two-week conference was by a 12-year old girl (here’s what she’s doing now).

Now, a generation later, my generation is faced with two seemingly insurmountable challenges: the world is changing at a rate never before seen, and the current governance structures are insufficient to meet even the environmental problems of the 1970s.

Continue reading ‘One Year to Earth Summit 2012: A New Generation Goes to Rio’

Guest post from Chuck Belmont Keeney, Ph.D. the descendant of famed UMWA organized Frank Keeney.  The March on Blair Mountain is currently happening in Southern WV.  For more information and to support the march visit www.marchonblairmountain.org

Nothing like this has happened to me before.

Walking the road to Blair Mountain, we pass an elementary school. Several of the teachers have taken their classes outside. The children and the teachers cheer us as we walk by.

Minutes later a man slows by the protesters in his pickup truck. He gives us the middle finger and yells, “Get a job, tree huggers!”

A few more paces and we witness an elderly couple on their front porch. They clap and nod. I notice that the old woman is crying. She tells us to keep going.

Others drive by and hurl obscenities in our direction. One sign on a house reads, “Thank You Marchers.” Another sign on a telephone pole warns, “Go Back To Where You Came From.”

Behold the road to Blair Mountain, where another civil war looms in the hills of Appalachia. Ninety years before, 10,000 armed coal miners marched to secure a decent living and to be treated as human beings. They fought an army paid for by the coal operators at the Battle of Blair Mountain. Miners bled and died to provide a better future for their children and, consequently, lay the groundwork for the privilege of weekends off, forty hour work weeks, and many of the other benefits that workers today enjoy. To date the Battle of Blair Mountain is the largest labor uprising in the history of our country.

Today there is a Second Battle of Blair Mountain. The coal companies want to destroy this historic ground with mountaintop removal and we are trying to save it. Marchers brave the heat, intimidation of the coal companies, and the ugliness of some who oppose us. When we originally planned the five day march we arranged to stay at various parks and campsites along the way. While many of these places initially welcomed us, they have all, within the last few days, told us that we can no longer stay at their sites. We then found alternative camp sites. These places too, have since withdrawn their support. Some of them have refused us because of threats from the coal companies; others have not given us specific reasons. What we do know is that many of the owners of these campsites were very hospitable at first, but have since said with regret that we cannot rest on their property. Therefore, we are forced to shuttle marchers back and forth from our headquarters at Marmet each day.

Continue reading ‘The Second Battle of Blair Mountain’

via marchonblairmountain.org

Amidst threats and intimidation by King Coal’s supporters, 600 courageous marchers kicked off a five day march from Marmet, WV to Blair Mountain.

Blair Mountain was the site of the second largest armed insurrection (after the Civil War) in U.S. history. 8000-10000 miners fighting for union rights took up arms against hired coal thugs. Blair Mountain has been an iconic symbol for both the U.S. labor movement and West Virginia itself. And now coal companies want to strip mine Blair Mountain. They’ve already stripped it of its historical preservation status and are now seeking permitting to strip mine it.

In fact, they’ve already begun strip mining on parts of it or so I hear.

You can tell the WV Dept. of Environmental Protection – “Don’t let big coal destroy our history”, by sending a comment to tell them to protect Blair Mountain

While the 1921 marchers faced hardship and armed opposition (armed private security, bombs from planes, federal troops), the 2011 marchers are facing harassment by pro-coal supporters along the way. A tweet this morning from @marchonblairmt reported “Road has scattered clusters of opposition as honking coal trucks hug the the shoulder – marchers squeeze to fit on.” Continue reading ‘The March on Blair Mountain Begins’