campus greens

Greeting!
I'm writing to let you all in on a very exciting event which is in the making, right now. San Francisco State University Eco-Students are planning to make a trip on bikes to visit different campuses in California who are making sustainable changes to their campuses and in their communities and DOCUMENTING IT! We will be filming this ride and the interactions at the campuses, hopefully to be showed in late January, if all goes well.
Now, it's time for me to ask you lovely folks if you'd like to help, even in the slightest bit since we are really just starting out...
Our goal is to make contact and form some sort of relationship with students or people knowledgeable of sustainable actions at colleges in California. It can be anything, anyone, on or around campus which can be considered
GREEN. In opening up your knowledge, campus, hearts, you will helping a great cause for earthly sustainability, or at least the possibility of expanding the momentum toward it.
PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, e-mail me and tell me about your campus' greening efforts. Only good things can come from your effort if we all work and share together.
THANK YOU!


Nikki LePage
islandsparticus@yahoo.com

Please do whatever you can to support this effort. It is critical to progressive change in our communities and an open, democratic government that encourages participation rather than hindering voter options. Mayor West's victory is also key in the ongoing fight for environmental sustainability and social and economic justice.

Please feel free to forward this message widely. And please contact me if you have any questions at all. Your help is invaluable.

Thank you!!!

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Nader and Libertarians Not Welcome
A Splintered Antiwar Movement
By JOHN WALSH
The roster of speakers for the UFPJ demonstration in Washington D.C. on January 27 speaks volumes. The key was not so much who was included but who was not. The list of speakers certainly had a lot of wonderful activists in the peace movement, but to a considerable degree it was a line-up of Democrats and movie stars.
Ralph Nader, who was in Washington that weekend, was pointedly not invited to speak. On Saturday night Nader was reportedly inquiring of other independents just who had been invited to speak among their growing number. Imagine that; the only antiwar candidate in the 2004 elections was not an invited speaker, even though he and Cindy Sheehan drew tremendous applause at the last mass rally in 2005 (Notice how these rallies occur now only in only non-election years, nicely tailored to get activists to work for Dems, but not to pressure the Dems to take a strong anti-war stand.) The non-invitation removed Nader from the movement every bit as effectively as the censors armed with air brushes removed dissidents in the "socialist" Czech republic chronicled by Milan Kundera. Nor was there anyone who spoke as a representative of the Green Party, even though at least one speaker was in fact a Green and even though an informal survey showed an enormous number of people in the crowd were Greens or Green sympathizers. Yes, the Greens were "permitted" a feeder march but their only organized presence on the Mall that this writer could find was a small card table with three women staffing it.
There was not a single Libertarian speaker even though the Libertarians and Old Right have been far more outspoken in opposing the war than the liberal "Left." Compare the pages of The American Conservative or Antiwar.com with the editorials of The Nation, which endorsed the pro-war Kerry candidacy in 2004. This writer tried for months to get Ron Paul, the Libertarian/Republican Congressman from Texas, now a Republican presidential candidate, invited to speak at the rally and did so also in 2005. Several of us made an appeal to get Justin Raimondo, the Libertarian editor of Antiwar.com invited to speak. We got no response from UFPJ, and still have received none. In contrast, Raimondo advertised the UFPJ demonstration in a prominent place on his web site, and he even offered to pay his own air fare to D.C. to speak. But no response was forthcoming from whatever committee decides on the speakers, a committee which is none too visible. UFPJ was just plain rude to Raimondo. In general it appears that the liberal "Left" has scant knowledge about the Libertarians and less desire to acquire it. Libertarians are just "a bunch of selfish people," according to the PC liberals. But there are more things in heaven and earth than the very PC have dreamed of.
There were far fewer kaffiyas in evidence than in the past, the inevitable result of reading ANSWER out of the official antiwar movement. (To be fair, Noura Erekat and Joshua Reubner, both from the same organization, US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, spoke.) The only reason given for UFPJ's severing relations with ANSWER is that their members were "impossible to deal with in meetings." That is hardly a political reason. Bad manners are not a reason for excommunication. If so, the antiwar forces would not be talking to the crotchety Barney Frank. I do not know a lot about ANSWER, but I do have a great deal of respect for Ramsey Clark, one of its leaders. And I also have a lot of respect for ANSWER's ability to turn out young people and its boldness in organizing events like the demonstration against Bush on the occasion of his inauguration. At the demonstration I heard no mention of AIPAC's obvious role in ginning up the war on Iraq or Iran. At this point in the development of the movement after the paper of Measheimer and Walt and after Jimmy Carter's book, this is indeed a troubling omission.
What is the matter with Democratic politicians, you may say. Nothing, as such. And the politicians speaking at the rally were among the best that the timid Dems have to offer - Maxine Waters, John Conyers and Dennis Kucinich, for example. But these Democrats do not represent the Democratic Party; they are an idealistic few on its fringe. To have only Democrats and no others is to create the false impression that the Democratic Party is a vehicle for peace. And it creates false hopes about what the Dems will do without mighty pressure.
So the peace movement is being increasingly tied to the Democratic Party. This is certainly the strategy of MoveOn.org and of "P"DA ("Progressive" Democrats of America) ­ and now apparently also UFPJ. This may be why the rally seemed far smaller and certainly far less spirited, stodgy I would say, than in the past. Let's hope that the hard working and committed people working in UFPJ turn from this path and do more to bring the splintered movement together. Because if the antiwar movement is divided, we are subject to being conquered ­ just as surely as the Sunni and the Shia. It is time for the Democratic Party to serve the Peace Movement and not the other way around. We shall see what course UFPJ takes to turn this around. Right now, it does not look good.
John V. Walsh can be reached at John.Endwar@gmail.com.
A second piece on the lobbying day on January 29 will follow.

Pass on to all Greens IN THE US -- let's have a strong showing for the NYS Green Party!

http://wamc.org/

"If the election were held today, who would you cast your vote for in the US Senate race in New York? (...in this election, you're allowed to vote no matter what state you live in!)
- Incumbent Hillary Clinton, Democrat
- Peace activist Howie Hawkins, NYS Green Party
- Reagan-era Pentagon official KT McFarland, GOP
- Anti-War candidate Jeffrey T. Russell, Libertarian Party
- Former Yonkers Mayor John Spencer, GOP
- Anti-War candidate Jon Tasini, Democrat
- Bill Van Auken, Socialist Equality Party
- Mark Greenstein, Democrat
- Tom Weiss, Democrat
- Steve Greenfield, Democrat
- Other
- I don't know yet"

Thanks!
Brittany

ok, i am a driver, and from detroit originally, but i actually do care about the environment too and HATE how much hybrid and fuel efficiency has gone out the window. i saw this short cartoon today and wanted to share as a hello since i am new here

 click on the pic for a link

and hey, if this isn't ok, please let me know in the comments and then i will limit myself to blah blah comments and no linking. thanks

 

ps - i just realized that i can't link to the cartoon without an ad running before it, sorry. it's only a few seconds long, but the film is cute

xposted

I am a 20 year old bisexual female from the state of Indiana in the United States. I receive newletters from the Human Rights Campaign and was recently informed of a bill introduced to the U.S. Congress that would repeal the "don't ask, don't tell" policy currently enforced among homosexuals in the United States Military. Basically, any known homosexual will be prevented from joining the military or discharged from the military simply because they are gay. This new bill, called the Military Readiness Enhancement Act, would do away with "don't ask, don't tell" and institute complete tolerance of homosexuals in the military.

I wrote to my state representative, voicing my opinion on the bill, and asking him to support it. My request was denied. Apparently, my congressman believes that "homosexual activity is prejudicial to the good order and discipline of the armed services. For that reason, [he] oppose[s] any efforts that would allow known homosexuals to enter into or continue service in the military."

Now, I'm not a naive person, and I did not expect miracles. But I do believe that this world is gradually changing. As homosexual, bisexual, and transgender people are being more open about their sexuality, we are starting to be accepted for who and what we are. Change will not happen in a day... it may not even happen in a decade.

However, we need to let our voices be heard now, so that we can start changing the future one person at a time. For this reason, I'm asking you, whoever you are, wherever you're from, and whatever your sexuality is, to write to the United States Congress in support of this bill. It may not be passed and made into law, but at least we will let the U.S. government know that gay, bi, and transgender people everywhere are willing to stand up for their rights.

If you've gotten this far, thank you for reading, and please show your support for all homosexuals in the military by writing a letter today.

Megan LeRoy

(Cross-posted to many, many communities)

Hello there!

My name is Susan Rodgers and I am running for Champaign County Board District 8 in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois. If elected I will be the first student to ever hold a seat on the County Board in this area! The great thing about my race is that the Republican has pulled less than a fourth of the vote in past elections. This means that my candidacy has a chance of winning! However, to do this I need to get my name out there in every possible manner, yard signs, fliers, brochures,stickers, buttons, window signs. These things are expensive. I'm asking you, Campus Greens and supporters, to donate to my campaign and help get the first student elected to Champaign County Board! Not only would I be the first student, but also the first Green, and the only Latina woman. If you donate over 10 dollars and e-mail your address at Susan@votesusanrodgers.com I will send you a brochure about my campaign along with stickers, or buttons, or whichever items I am able to acquire.


to make a well concealed cash, money order, or check donation please send them to:

1005 W. Stoughton St. #310
Urbana IL
61801

make checks and money orders payable to SusanRaeRodgers C.T.E.

Thank you for you support!

Susan Rodgers

votesusanrodgers.com

I lifted this from the latest, greatest, issue of Adbusters. Bloody Brilliant. I won't be able to sleep tonight at the thought of it.


Great Plains
Ian Frazier

This, finally, is the punch line of our two hundred years on the Great Plains: we trap out the beaver, subtract the Mandan, infect the Blackfeet and the Hidatsa and the Assinboin, overdose the Arikara; call the land a desert and hurry across it to get to California and Oregon; suck up the buffalo, bones and all; kill off nations of elk and wolves and cranes and prairie chickens and prairie dogs; dig up the gold and rebury it in vaults somewhere else; ruin the Sioux and Cheyenne and Arapaho and Crow and Kiowa and Comanche; kill Crazy Horse, kill Sitting Bull; harvest wave after wave of immigrants' dreams and send the wised-up dreamers on their way; plow the topsoil until it blows to the ocean; ship out the wheat, ship out the cattle; dig up the earth itself and burn it in power plants and send the power down the line; dismiss the small farmers, empty the little towns; drill the oil and the natural gas and pipe it away; dry up the rivers and the springs, deep-drill for irrigation water as the aquifer retreats. And in return we condense unimaginable amounts of treasure into weapons buried beneath the land that so much treasure came from - weapons for which our best hope might be that we will someday take them apart and throw them away, and for which our next-best hope certainly is that they remain humming away under the prairie, absorbing fear and maintenance, unused, forever.

We were there in Seattle.

We were in Cancun when Kun Hai Lee plunged a knife into his chest in order to be heard. We were in Oakland when the police shot wooden dowels into fleeing protesters' backs. We were in Miami when we were all hunted down by a militarized police force, the copters lurking as the "less-lethal" weapons flew at us.

We are the Street Medics. A loose network of grassroots health care providers that go where EMTs cannot tread, into the chaos and confusion of political unrest. We are there, at your side, when you need us.

And we need your help.

Street Medics are organizing and converging on New York City at this very moment, preparing the infrastructure that will support the community health needs of all the people of all the demonstrations. But without your help we won't be able to do this. We need to rent, buy, or acquire UHF radios, base stations, and repeaters, build chemical decontamination stations, purchase liability insurance for spaces that are hosting us, purchase medical supplies, metrocards, and a thousand other tiny things. It all adds up, and we are generally funded out of our own pockets. And
right now, our pockets are empty.

Please give what you can, in money, equipment, supplies, or come to a training and give yourself. But to be honest, we need the money to secure communications equipment and host spaces for our Wellness Centers. We need $2,000 for the radios, and $5,000 altogether.

If we don't achieve this, we will still be there. In the streets, at your side, at 2 in the morning. But we won't be able to be as available as we could be. But whatever happens, we will be there, with our duct tape, our first aid, our skills, and our passion.

Please be there for us.

Thank you.
kaitlyn tikkun
pocketmonster@optonline.net
646 420 3758

(this funding effort is being coordinated by MANYC(The Medical Activists
of New York City) Serving the public health, and the health of the Republic. For more information check out http://www.takethestreets.org

TO ATTEND THE BIGGEST PARTY OF THE YEAR W/ OTHER EXPRESSING THEMSELVES AGAINST THE CURRENT ADMINISTRATION & TO FIND OUT MORE ABOUT EVENTS SURROUNDING THE REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION (RNC) please check out:
- http://www.rncnotwelcome.org
- http://www.counterconvention.org
- http://nycplc.mahost.org/updates3.…
- http://www.rncguide.com/
- http://rncwatch.typepad.com/
- http://www.visualresistance.org/