Category: Environment

Last week, Friends of the Earth Action (“FOE Action”) endorsed John Edwards.

This week, I interviewed Brent Blackwelder, President of Friends of the Earth and FOE Action, about the endorsement of John Edwards.  Part I of the interview is in this diary. 

Here’s a little about FOE Action for those unfamiliar with it:

Founded by David Brower in 1967, Friends of the Earth Action has established a 35-year record of not only fighting the tough battles, but winning them too.  FoE Action provides extra political muscle on legislative battles here in the U.S. for to our sister organization, Friends of the Earth, which is part of a network of affiliates in over 70 nations around the world. 

snip

FoE Action looks beyond the symptoms of environmental degredation, to the systemic causes.

FOE Action

Come around after the fold to hear a real hero of the struggle to save our planet.

Note:  Please forgive the re-post – still seems relevant.

Life on earth, in fact all life (as far as we know) is sustained by the razor thin and fragile atmosphere of a relatively tiny random globe in an obscure and nondescript solar system based on a third rate star hugging the inner edge of one immense spiral arm of a generic spiral galaxy in a far flung region of the vast and only Universe we know (although we are beginning to suspect that there may be others – see Multiverse Theory).

Cross-posted from The Environmentalist

Amidst alarms raised about the loss of ice in the polar regions, the extreme droughts across the US, the floods in the UK earlier this year, the increasingly unstable nature of the weather worldwide, a new concern has been raised about the Southern Oceans’ inability to absorb and store CO2:

The Southern Ocean around Antarctica is so loaded with carbon dioxide that it can barely absorb any more, so more of the gas will stay in the atmosphere to warm up the planet, scientists reported on Thursday.

Human activity is the main culprit, said researcher Corinne Le Quere, who called the finding very alarming. The phenomenon wasn’t expected to be apparent for decades, Le Quere said in a telephone interview from the University of East Anglia in Britain. “We thought we would be able to detect these only the second half of this century, say 2050 or so,” she said. But data from 1981 through 2004 show the sink is already full of carbon dioxide.

more below the jump…

Don’t forget that today is International Blog Action day for the Environment.  I’m not a regular writer on environmental issues, so rather than post something generic and/or sloppily researched, I’ll instead provide a roundup of articles and blog posts that are popping up all over the internet by far more qualified writers.  Check some of these out, give feedback to the authors to let them know you’re reading, and spread the word at sites that may not know about today’s Blog Action.

The internet is still a fledgling tool for activism, and whatever successes it has had have been modest at best.  Whether this kind of collective harnessing of powers can have any real impact remains to be seen, but it’s at least refreshing to see authors all over the world participating, sharing what they know, and trying to get their readers excited about an important cause.  At any rate, I hope you enjoy reading these as much as I have…

In honor of Blog Action Day, this year focused on the environment:

I’m going to throw cold water on the future with news of possible, impending, $100 oil (that’s £48.97, 70.49 EU) on the horizon, if oil companies don’t move soon pull to back on their current policies. 

Is it because of supply and demand?  China and India?  The Kurds and the Turks?  The mess in Iraq?  All of the above?

Well… Yes and no.

What are the oil companies citing as their next reason for raising prices?

“Lower Profits”

(Now, now, try to not to spit on the screen in laughter)

More below the jump.

(Updated with permalink)Many of you here at Docudharma really helped to get the early word out about this project when Lynxgirl posted this diary, so you might enjoy this little follow-up. You may even agree that this is cooler than Greenland, although that’s not saying much these days.

Click on the link below and first there’s a great Myles O’Brien piece about Gore and climate change. But stay tuned because right after, you’ll see a lovely piece about Blanket the Globe. First Gore. Then my daughter, Casey. Then a bit about the Solar Decathlon and the battle over water with Bill Richardson. Great company!

Click here for the CNN Student News newscast.

The newscast and accompanying photo album are terrific.

Have you, your kids, your students, your grandkids, your neighbors, your friends, made squares?  If so, be sure to find their art work in the BTG slide show.  If not, Why?  Everything you need is right on the website.

(proud mama over at T&P)

Through October 15, I plan to devote my Pony Party slots to support International Blog Action Day and its focus on our environment. I’ve found a sweet site, Save Our Planet Web Ring, that puts into context the everyday ways in which we can impact the earth for good or bad. I will add my own thing to the list of what we can do: simply, to believe that we have the power to make this world more equitable and more just. Jump below the fold… I really like the examples used by this site