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Here are my birthday wishes for today, my 26th birthday.
- I wish everyone in this country had access to top quality health care. Health care that includes as many holistic options as conventional ones.
- I wish single mothers got paid as much as married mothers. I wish mothers got paid as much as single women. And I wish all women got paid as much as men.
- I wish parents who abandoned their children would be held accountable for their actions, and that conservative talking heads would stop spouting cruelty about the parents who actually do stick around.
- I wish every consenting adult is able to make a legal commitment binding them in love to any other consenting adult.
- I wish the government would stop subsidizing junk food.
- I wish the whole world would go see Food Inc. and The Business of Being Born.
- I wish you would become a fan of Rock Your Birth Doula Services on Facebook.
- I wish all single moms, and especially all single pregnant women, would read Mari Gallion’s book, The Single Woman’s Guide to a Happy Pregnancy.
- I wish that President Obama would actually do something worth getting the Republicans this angry.
- I wish people would start voting for third parties.
- I wish world governments would take the 350 goals seriously.
- I wish Whole Foods hadn’t bought out Wild Oats, and Wild Oats hadn’t bought out Alfalfa’s.
- I wish Placebo hadn’t cancelled their American tour.
- I wish this country and culture would make ease of breast feeding for all women a top priority.
- I wish the United States had a maternity leave policy like Canada does. One year off at 60% of your pay, plus one optional year off, unpaid.
- I wish mothering were recognized as the full time job that it is.
- I wish men would stop lying about how tall they are.
- I wish companies built consumer goods to last, instead of to break, become obsolete, or go out of style within a year or two (or less!).
- I wish we’d get serious about alternative fuel and energy resources.
- I wish CAFOs would go away.
- I wish we would crack down on companies who hire illegal immigrants, instead of cracking down on the illegal immigrants individually. Companies who hire illegal immigrants usually do it so that they can commit grievous human rights violations without fear of penalty.
- I wish we focused more on Fair Trade and less on NAFTA.
- I wish all chemicals had to be tested for safety before they are put on the market in consumer goods.
- I wish drug companies weren’t allowed to advertise to the general public.
- I wish there were an ocean in Colorado, and also a place where avocados, bananas and citrus fruit would grow, then I would have no problem going to an entirely local diet.
- I wish I could speed read.
- I wish that I will be able to send Elijah to schools that don’t focus on standardized tests, especially not in Kindergarten. On that note, I wish every parent in America would read Crisis in the Kindergarten.
- I wish I was a size 10 again.
- I wish my mouse would stop doing the weird stuff its doing.
Now I’m going to go make some potato soup for my birthday meal. Yum.
This is copy and pasted directly from an email I got. Please sign!
Friday is the last day to voice your opinion on whether the EPA — the Environmental Protection Agency — should regulate carbon dioxide pollution, the primary cause of the climate crisis. This is a big deal.
The EPA is taking public comment, before making a ruling.
Of course, special interests — like the oil and coal lobbies — are working overtime to defeat a positive ruling and have already gotten thousands of comments submitted in opposition.
Most people don’t know about this opportunity for public comment, so your voice can make a real difference. And with a new president in the White House, it’s likely that someone will actually be listening. Submit your public comment to the EPA here:
http://www.RepowerAmerica.org/EPA
In April 2007 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Environmental Protection Agency has the authority to regulate carbon dioxide if it is harming our health and welfare. After more than a year of delay, the EPA is finally now requesting public comments on whether carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping pollutants are endangering our health and our climate.
Join us, and send a message about how crucial it is to reduce harmful carbon dioxide pollution. That you expect the EPA to use its powers to protect our health and welfare. That we can “Repower America” by using energy sources that don’t emit carbon dioxide, and make the switch to 100% clean electricity. And that the solutions to the climate crisis are the same ones needed to address our economic and security challenges.
This is our chance to go on the public record — all the comments will be posted on the EPA’s website. To post your public comment, just go here.
For nearly eight years, the Bush administration has done nothing to address the growing threats we face from global warming. Hurricanes are getting stronger, the North polar icecap is melting, and we’ve suffered through intense droughts, floods and killer heat waves.
The deadline is November 28th. Let’s help end the era of delay.
Thanks,
Cathy Zoi
CEO
www.RepowerAmerica.org
I read this today on the Yes Magazine website. I think it is worth reposting and spreading around.
Has the cash economy swallowed up your life? Here are some ways to extract some of your time and “life energy” from the cash economy.
Reduce debt. If you can’t pay cash, don’t buy it. Practice being mindful about what you buy and why.
Do it yourself. Grow food, pick berries, can and preserve food, make wine, bake bread. Make or repair clothes, furniture, and gifts. Create your own entertainment. Walk, bike, run, or play basketball instead of joining a fitness club.
Share & Exchange. Take care of neighbor kids and elders. Play music, sing, act in local theater, write poems, hold art shows. Exchange haircuts for applesauce, bike repair for massage, language tutoring for babysitting.
Reduce waste & pollution. Weatherize your home or apartment. Reduce your car usage, or get rid of a car.
Buy local. Run buy-local campaigns, print stickers, publish or post a directory of local businesses. Acknowledge business owners who foster the well-being of the environment, employees, and the whole community. Convert public funds from luring outside corporations to supporting local businesses.
Start a new local business. Start a food market, credit union, wifi network, or even an electricity co-op. Explore ownership options like cooperatives, nonprofits, for-profits, or single proprietorships.
Buy Fair Traded when you buy imports. Vote with your dollar for a better world for all.
I spend a lot of the day reading blogs and articles and books to keep myself informed about what I can do to protect my family from dangers and to do something to stem the onslaught of global warming (and to protect the environment in other ways). I am a member of nearly a dozen forums to discuss just these issues (how to do it the greenest, the cheapest, the biggest impact-est), and a member of several community groups which address some of these same issues. I spend a lot of time on these matters, more than twice the amount of time I spent on them a year or two ago, despite the fact that I have less time to spend on anything now, because I am a mother.
I want the best for Elijah, and I am certain that he will want the same for his kids, and his kids will want the same for their kids. Is there anyone out there who doesn’t want to give their children not only the best, but the opportunity to one day give their children the best? If there is, they need to have their children taken away from them, because they are not fit parents.
I want to share everything I’ve learned with the world, its been a lot. I’m learning still more every day. Heres a quick run down of what I’ve learned today, for example.
Sign a petition to eliminate BPA from baby bottles BPA leeches out of plastics and gets into our food (or is absorbed by our skin) and mimics estrogen in our bodies, leading to all sorts of nasty side effects, from uncontrolled weight gain and inability to lose weight, to cancer, infertility and genital deformation in your children. It can also cause boys to grow breasts. Yikes!
Note: I actually started writing this weeks ago! I never found time to finish and publish. So I’m publishing now. I hope the links still work. Enjoy!
I am a little bothered by the amount of people who talk about peak oil but don’t seem to know what it is. I am no expert, by any means, but I became interested in the subject when I took a geology class a few years ago and we discussed it one day. I wrote a term paper on it, and I got an A, so my information must be relatively good.
The theory of peak oil production was first introduced by M. King Hubbert, a geologist working for Shell in the late 50s. It discussed the mathematical certainty that oil production, like all finite resources, will increase more and more over time until it will one day peak, and production will begin to decrease. Let me use a handy (and not mathematical) metaphor to explain how and why this happens.
Imagine if you will, that you have a can of soda that you have shaken up. When you shake up that soda, the carbonation causes it to expand, putting the contents of the can under great pressure. When you open the can, you have created a place for that soda to expand into, and the pressure is released, causing the soda to spray up in your face, right?
Just like shaken soda in a can, oil is formed deep in the earth under massive pressure. When you first drill into an oil mine, the pressure is released just like when you open the soda can, and it bursts up through the air (known in the oil industry as a gusher).
Now, eventually that soda is going to stop spraying out of the can, and there is still going to be a lot of soda left in it. That’s because the soda only expands as much as it needs to to relieve the pressure, then it stops expanding. But you still want to get that soda out and drink it, right? So you stick a straw in the can, and start sucking it out.
Just like the soda, the oil only expands as much as it needs to to relieve the pressure, and when it stops, there’s still a ton of oil down in the well. So we have stuck pipes and whatnot down there and started pumping it up.
Now, the more soda you suck out of that can, the lower the soda level gets, the further you have to suck it up, so the harder you have to suck. Just like with the soda, the lower the oil reserves get, the more energy it takes to suck that oil up. The problem is that the machines we use to pump it up are run off of … drum roll please … oil! And the harder (more energy intensive) it gets to pump oil, the more oil we’re going to be using to get it out. Eventually we will be using one barrel of oil for every one barrel of oil we pull out of the ground. At this point, oil becomes an energy sink (meaning we’re using more energy to produce it than we’re getting out of it), and production will stop.
When this happens, 30% to 50% of the oil reserves will still be in the mines, but we will be unable to pull it up. Even if we use some other energy source to power the machines that pump up the oil, we would be using more energy calories pulling the oil up than there are energy calories in the oil. We would be wasting energy.
This already happened in the United States. Our oil production peaked back in the 70’s. What we are anticipating now is a peak in world wide production.
This happens with all finite resources. It happened with zinc in the 19th century. It will happen with coal eventually. It will happen with uranium eventually. And since, incidentally, it takes WAY more coal to get the same amount of energy a barrel of oil provides us with, we will be facing peak coal production much quicker than we faced peak oil production if we replace oil with “clean coal technology”. Same deal with nuclear technology, since it depends on uranium.
There is no energy source on this planet that gives us as many calories per unit as petrolium does. Coal comes closest, and its still not near the energy powerhouse oil is. Plus its way dirtier. I hear all this talk about clean coal technology, but I am skeptical of it. We’ll probably lean heavily on coal at first when peak oil starts becoming a real problem, but we wont want to stay there for long.
When people think about peak oil, they think its just going to mean that we won’t be able to drive anymore, but the scary thing about it is that it will affect much more than just our cars. Gas is required to ship all of our food and goods, and without gas we’ll all be suddenly reliant on an entirely local diet and economy, the resources for which don’t exist in a big enough quantity to keep us all fed and clothed. Because big agribusiness focuses on growing only one crop in massive quantities so to be shipped all over the world, everyone in the world relies very heavily on food produced far away for a balanced diet. When peak oil happens the people in kansas, for example, may find themselves living almost exclusively on wheat, soy and sunflowers. People on the East Coast can almost certainly kiss beef goodbye. Not only this, but gas is used to power all the equipment that water, harvest, and prepare all those crops before they are even shipped.
Then of course there’s all the petrochemical fertilizers that make crops produce at the levels they produce at. Without them, huge agribusiness will not be able to grow as many crops. Not to mention that most of our fibers, foams, fabrics, plastics, medicines, cosmetics, soaps, household cleaners and all sorts of wonders of modern chemistry are petrochemical based, and production of them will stop when peak oil happens too. In fact, a lot of our food is entirely or primarily petrochemical based, so when peak oil happens, say goodbye to things like Cool Whip and Margarine.
So much of our world, not just our energy, relies on oil. As far as energy goes, we will need to employ every alternative means of producing energy we have available to replace oil. Its not just enough to focus on solar, or wind, or geothermal. We’re going to need it all, and we’re going to need it fast. Most experts agree that the harshest of peak oil affects will be upon us in the next 10 years or so, and judging by the rising cost of energy, food, and resources, plus the fact that oil production seems to have pretty much plateaued since 1998, its looking pretty likely that its already starting.
For more information on the theory of peak oil supply, I highly recommend the books by Kenneth Deffeyes.
Really, its not ripping off, its just spreading the word. As if my post will have anywhere near the same impact as his does. My readership of, what, 10 people? (thats my best guess, I have no idea) doesn’t nearly compare to his readership, since his blog is actually on this list I’m about to publish! Furthermore, most of my readers, I’m pretty sure, are coming to my blog from his when they read comments I made on his blog.
Anyhow, heres a list of the top 15 environmental sites as named by Time.com.
#1 – Grist I already link to this site on my side bar, FACE! I rule.
#2 – Treehugger
#3 – Dot Earth
#4 – Climate Change My work wont let me open this page, so I hope my link works
#5 – RealClimate
#6 – Environmental Capital
#7 – No Impact Man My favorite
#8 – EcoGeek
#9 – EcoRazzi
#10 – Switchboard
#11 – Mongabay
#12 – Climate Ethics
#13 – Climate Progress
#14 – World Changing
#15 – Planet Ark
Most of these I don’t know, I’m checking them out myself. If I like them, they’ll appear on my side bar (two of them are already there). I hope you all enjoy and find them informative.
I wish I could say its happy for me, but I am kind of bummed.
I had all sorts of fun Earth Day activities planned for the weekend, but I took my friend out on Friday night to celebrate her birthday and her big promotion, and I got terrible food poisoning and spent the whole weekend throwing up. It was awful. Now I’m sad. Something always happens to me to prevent me from taking part in Earth Day celebrations.
I don’t know why “living green” is perceived as a partisan issue. What’s so partisan about it?
When asked if they would like to drink a cup full of Raid bug killer, 100 out of 100 hundred Republicans and 100 out of 100 Democrats all said no. The response was the same when I asked if they’d be willing to let their kids drink that cup full of Raid.
When asked if they’d like to give me, a complete stranger, 37 bucks, 100 out of 100 Republicans and 100 out of 100 Democrats all said no. The response was the same when I pointed out some other random stranger to give the money to.
When asked if they’d like for me to come onto their property and leave a bunch of trash and shit all over, eat all their food, take all their expensive jewelry and mess up their furniture and electronics, 100 out of 100 Republicans and 100 out of 100 Democrats all said no. The response was the same for those who rent.
So what’s the hold up? Apparently, both Republicans and Democrats are unanimously opposed to ingesting poisons and toxins. Apparently, both Republicans and Democrats are unanimously opposed to forking over their hard earned money to a stranger (especially given that they don’t have to, because there are other alternatives). Apparently both Republican and Democrats are unanimously opposed to having their resources used up and their homes trashed.
So if the ultimate goal of the “green movement” is to reduce our exposure to toxins and poisons, save us money that would otherwise be going to line the pockets of oil and energy tycoons, and to keep the place where we live pleasant and productive, how in God’s name is this a partisan issue?
