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by Carolyn Baker
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Ten years ago this moment, America was awaiting the inauguration of a new President. We knew that the new Bush administration would bring at least four years of darkness, but we had no idea how dark, nor that a second hijacked election would follow the first, nor the extent to which the influence of Bush II would extend into the future. Certainly, we had no inkling of 9/11 and that terror — both politically and psychologically would overshadow every day of the
coming decade. Nor could we have anticipated the trauma of the Bush years and its lingering legacy for generations to come. |
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by Peter Goodchild
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As humanity plunges ever more deeply into the age of declining resources, what will be the future of law and order? The particular problem of which I am thinking might be called, more specifically, “future violence,” since other acts that are now deemed criminal may seem trivial in later days. Unfortunately all discussion of violence becomes an emotional issue, and a rational answer may be elusive. After all, for most human beings the most terrifying actions on the planet Earth are probably those involving physical assault by other humans. It is therefore hard to get a calm or rational response from people with whom one discusses the matter. |
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by Peter Goodchild
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Editor's note: In response to the Fortune magazine/CNN.com report on Detroit's urban farming trend, the author has provided some basics on crops and human needs. The original posting regarding "Can farming save Detroit?" is at the end of the author's remarks. - JL
The amount of land needed for farming with manual labor would depend on several factors: the type of soil, the climate, and the kinds of crops to be grown. The highest-yielding varieties are not necessarily the most disease-resistant, or the most suitable for the climate or the soil, or the easiest to store. |
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by V.I. Postnikov
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I have always been wary about technologies, despite the fact that I graduated as an electrical engineer, and defended two dissertations. The Chernobyl disaster put an end to my infatuation with science, and revived my interest in poetry, philosophy and nature. Since the late ‘80s, I was gradually converted into the Luddite type of a scientist and stepped onto a shaky path of techno-criticism.
I remember my enthusiasm when, in the mid-‘90s, I found in the America House Library a book openly criticizing the technological society. I knew then I was not alone. |
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by Albert Bates
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"Cokenhagen" blog's last day
Leaving Copenhagen before sunrise, we passed into the airport terminal revolving doors, each panel emblazoned with the "Hopenhagen" logo, but beneath it was revealed Hopenhagen's corporate sponsor, Coca Cola, taking credit for the advertising campaign. Hope has died but Coke survived.
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by Peter Crabb
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In the wake of the failure of the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen to deliver anything other than business as usual, questions about the intentions and efficacy of official powers—government, the U.N., nonprofits, and corporate puppet masters—should be foremost on our minds. The conclusion that they won’t do what needs to be done to save our planet from anthropogenic destruction seems to be inescapable. So, as Culture Change Editor Jan Lundberg bluntly put it, “The real state of affairs is truly, ‘It's up to us.’”
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by Jan Lundberg
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The unnatural dominant culture, coldly spewing its noise and heat, subjecting
us to dirty machines and pavement, no longer makes sense in terms of our
needs as humans. But don't let it get you down and make you give up.
Play your guitar, enjoy the company of friends, or whatever else
restores your humanity. Perhaps the songs and the
conversations will lead to some liberation and justice, alleviating
the pain of this senseless system running our lives into the
ground. But we must do even more. Finding a "better job" is no
solution long-term, however much we think we need money to survive. |
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by Albert Bates
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My COP15 Journal: Day Sixteen, Dec. 19
"Goodbye Africa, goodbye south Asia; goodbye glaciers and sea ice, coral reefs and rainforest; it was nice knowing you, not that we really cared. The governments which moved so swiftly to save the banks have bickered and filibustered while the biosphere burns."
— George Monbiot, The Guardian, Dec. 18, 2009
Last Day: When we arrived in Copenhagen 16 days ago, we were met by Ross and Hildur Jackson, our hosts at a farm near Birkerød, just outside the city. |
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by Jan Lundberg
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Although one yearns for global warming to indeed not exceed 2 degrees Celsius (or less, as African countries demand), the take-home message from the Copenhagen COP meeting is that polluters and growth mongers, large and small, will not let up. This is because they are not being forced to -- whether by their own peoples or by natural forces such as ecological or economic collapse. Most diabolical is the intention to switch energy as the main strategy for climate protection, when it will not work.
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by Albert Bates
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 Wednesday, December 16, 2009
My COP15 Journal: Day Thirteen
A few years ago, when the Local Agenda-21 group for Copenhagen (Agenda 21 was the name of the sustainable development plan the UN launched at the Earth Summit in Rio) started to look at what kind of changes might be needed to place the city on a more sustainable path through the challenges of the coming century, they requested a guided tour of Christiania. |
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by Sarah (Steve) Mosko
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Editor's note: Don't skip this article just because you may not have a
lawn to turn into a veggie patch. Mosko provides fabulous background,
such as the post-WWII development that "chemical weapons
manufacturers funneled stockpiles of compounds used for making
poisonous gases and explosives into making pesticides and nitrogen
fertilizers." Southern California remains a crazy place, so let's hope
Mosko is heard: "The energy required for desalination far exceeds that
for water importation." - JL
Which consumes more fossil fuels, lawn maintenance with gas-powered
tools or lawn watering? |
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by David Rovics
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"Copenhagen police ended up preemptively arresting nearly a thousand people Saturday. Another 230 protesters were preemptively arrested on Sunday during a demonstration to block the city’s ports." - Dec. 14, Democracy Now
The signs up all over the airport and various places elsewhere in town are calling it Hopenhagen, but everybody I know is calling it Cop-enhagen, which seems far more appropriate. The international media have been giving this lots of coverage, and rightly so. |
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