That fat collection of superb environmentally oriented diaries appearing at Daily Kos last week was no accident. Had Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse not invented the concept and cajoled – in some cases, corralled – dozens of bloggers to join the effort, wedging 50 spare-time hours between those of a full-time job, Eco Week would never have happened. Without Land of Enchantment’s partnership in the organizing, drafting of bloggers, the scheduling, and other day-to-day work such a project demands, it wouldn’t have happened. LoE also created a photo array that put razzmatazz into the promotion.
Fourteen diarists signed up originally, but 64 eventually joined the writing end of the project. They turned out 80 enlightening, sometimes joyful, sometimes disturbing essays, analyses and round-ups across a broad range of eco-subjects. Some of them were veterans, having written greenish stuff at Daily Kos for several years. Others wrote their first eco-diary ever. Several Kossacks who produce weekly or more frequent series diaries turned one or more of them to an environmental topic. They proved that there’s an environmental angle to nearly everything we humans do. Ties were found to health care, jobs, the economy, labor, political stability, family, equal justice, human rights and poverty. Our diaries explained these linkages and the need for sustainability. Here is a link to all those diaries.
Writing wasn’t the only aspect of Eco Week. It also provided an opportunity to initiate a new eco-bloggers advocacy group, DK GreenRoots. That will be our workroom where activists and other interested participants interconnect, inform each other, encourage the writing and cross-posting of diaries, teach research techniques, initiate short- and long-term working groups, develop special projects, hone our persuasive skills, plan political action, and draft legislation.
If that sounds ambitious, it is. But there are a lot of us already signed up for this collaborative effort. With new additions every day, more than 325 people have joined DK GreenRoots. As people get acquainted, between now and Netroots Nation in August, we’ll take the first steps in getting some or all of those activities under way. We have a GreenRoots website in development that will roll out shortly after Labor Day. Soon we will have a private forum created for GreenRoots to assist discussions as well as projects and working groups.
Collaborative projects are only as good as are the people committed to making things happen in a cooperative manner. Which makes DK GreenRoots especially exciting because many of those involved have previously demonstrated they’re willing and able. We don't seek to be anybody's rival. Our goal is to build alliances. If you haven’t joined yet, you can find us at DK GreenRoots.
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The rescue begins below and continues in the jump.
Jill Richardson put together a good model to copy in Meet the Lobbyists!, in her case, the food lobbyists of various sorts.
A Siegel pitted ACES vs Reality: "Due in part to our economic turmoil, but also due to increasing natural gas supplies and the double-digit annual growth rate of renewable energy and energy efficiency measures, US greenhouse gas emissions are falling ... In fact, by the end of this year, the United States might be half-way toward achieving the emissions reductions targets set in the Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy and Security (ACES) Act that recently passed the House and is now in the Senate for consideration. The reality of falling emissions provides yet another tangible reason for strengthening ACES. ... Coal is of declining importance: Coal continues its fall in terms of percentage of total electricity. Coal has not been 50% of US electricity for awhile and the downward trend is one that we should continue ... and work to accelerate ... to help foster ending our coal addiction, weaning ourselves off coal rather than expending $10s of billions on illusion of ‘clean coal.’"
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The Overnight News Digest is posted. Included is the story Taliban infiltrate once-peaceful Afghan north.
polar bear Live blogged the Climate Change & Energy Bill (ACES) and so did sewenviro: Senator Jim Inhofe cited a 6-day-old Rasmussen poll in which 56% of Americans say they are not willing to pay anything to fight global warming."
davidwalters had a big problem with the World Wildlife Federation and nuclear fact-fixing: "The World Wildlife Federation is an active anti-nuclear organization. Over on energfromthorium.com, a subscriber noted a fascinating and revealing footnote to the way anti-nuclear groups interpret data: they lie when they don't like the data they find. .In a long report here. The WWF notes that a country like France has low carbon emissions. It has a problem, because it's low due to it's massive use of non-carbon nuclear electricity. Ouch. So...what do they do? The change the data ..."
epjmcginley offered some more Thoughts on an Agrarian Nation: "It seems that deep within us resides a biological imperative, and it is hunger. So much of our culture is developed around the practice that accompanies satisfying this biological imperative. Once satisfied by simple scavenging, our success eventually enabled a more careful selection. Eventually all of the cultivated plants and animals we enjoy the fruits of today sprung from the unique expression of this primitive impulse. Generations of development later, most of us have been called away from the land. Our ancestors, some by choice and some by force, were again extracted from the ecology that gestated and nurtured them. Once with the move to agriculture, and again with the move away from it. Hunger is now satisfied by an intricate and far reaching network of producers and manufacturers. Food is produced and processed and shipped on a massive scale, from every corner of the world."
denis diderot reported that the White House Announced Food Safety "Changes: "Back to the Future: Obama Administration Recycling Clinton-Era Food Safety Initiatives as New. This morning, Agriculture Secretary Vilsack and Vice-President Biden will issue ‘key finding,’ according to an email from Nick Shapiro, Office of the Press Secretary, in The White House, that was sent to several media outlets. According to press release, entitled President’s Food Safety Working Group: Delivering Results, the Obama administration is going to implement "a new public health-focused approach to food safety based on three core principles: (1) prioritizing prevention; (2) strengthening surveillance and enforcement; and (3) improving response and recovery." Although these principles are laudable, and anything would be an improvement over the Bush administration’s efforts to put industry profits above the public health, most of what is being announced today is recycled from Clinton years, and all are incremental steps that seek improvements around the edges rather than the much needed structural change to the U.S. food safety system."
Oil, Gas Market Speculation May Face Restrictions Commodities Commission, wrote
snaglepuss: "Here’s some good news. Bloomberg is reporting that the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) will holding hearings on whether or not to limit speculative trading in commodities markets, with a focus on energy. As everyone should know by now, $147. oil last year was not about peak oil and supply and demand, it was about speculation by hedge funds, banks and investment banks."
gmoke reviewed a book by Shaun Chamberlin: Transition Timeline for a Local, Resilient Future: "The Transition Town movement started in Ireland and England in 2005 and now has extended all around the world. It is a local, town by town, citizens' movement which prepares people and communities for the transformation of our energy regimen in the face of Peak Oil and climate change. The idea is to envision a workable future taking climate and the decarbonization of our fuel cycle into consideration and begin practical steps to make the transition to that future. It is an extremely powerful exercise."
DelilahStarling claimed that Sarah Palin was worse than Bush on wildlife and environment: "Whether the subject is drilling in ANWR, killing wolves from airplanes, or applauding the recent 6-3 vote by the Supreme Court that will allow 4.5 million tons of mine waste to be dumped into Alaska’s Lower Slate Lake; Alaska’s Republican Governor, Sarah Palin was worse than George W. Bush on wildlife and the environment."
paradox posted photos of St. Jude's Food Bank Garden, July 1, 2009.
RLMiller urged people to Help Draft Yosemite Plan: "The Merced River is now the tool being used to manage Yosemite's biggest threat, the hordes of people in Yosemite Valley. Twelve years after a flood wiped out campgrounds and rerouted the river, it's back to the drawing board to draft a plan for the river -- and thus Yosemite Valley. Yellowstone has snowmobiles for its political hot potato; Yosemite has something far more basic, people. How many people should be allowed to enjoy the Merced River's vicinity, also known as the incomparable Yosemite Valley?"